


If I Had A Heart

by Ilerre



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous Relationships, Animal Abuse, Child Abuse, Drugs, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Morally Ambiguous Character, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Possessive Behavior, Protective Merle, Protectiveness, Torture, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-25
Updated: 2015-07-27
Packaged: 2018-04-01 05:40:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 46,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4007965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ilerre/pseuds/Ilerre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The night Daryl was born was pitch black. No star in sight, no moon, just heavy clouds threatening to pour down on them at any moment. It was also the hottest night in Georgia since 1916. Merle felt something was wrong with his baby brother.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. If I had a heart I could love you

0

The night Daryl was born was pitch black. No star in sight, no moon, just heavy clouds threatening to pour down on them at any moment. It was also the hottest night in Georgia since 1916.

Merle snorted, sitting in a broken down camping chair in front of the shitty trailer he called home, fifteen and already angry at the whole world. His father was pacing in front of him, angry as well, but more about the fact he couldn't slouch in front of the TV with a bottle of whisky than any anxiousness about his wife birthing his second son inside, alone.

Merle could hear his mother pant, cry, and moan in pain but wouldn't go inside. The day she told him she was pregnant, he couldn't think he could dislike her more than he already did, but like many times in life, Merle had been wrong.

Tonight, he hated the bitch.

Maybe it was unconscious human protectiveness toward kin or some kind of bitterness at his own birth, but Merle couldn't forgive his mother for bringing a new baby to their world. What did she think? Did she hope this new son was her way to atone for what she missed and did wrong with Merle? Did she think she could do better this time?

Then, at the crack of dawn and after more than ten hours of labor, Merle heard the cry of the newborn Dixon. The sky opened up with great blinding bolts of lightening, rain poured down in a flood ominously announcing more grief than joy, and baby Daryl entered the world hungry and pissed. 

Later, Merle sneered at the scrawny thing in her arms but lifted a skeptical eyebrow when the baby bit down hard on their mother's tit, refusing to drink her milk and making her gasp in pain.

If anything, Daryl had some fire in him.

0

Daryl's skin was always hot.

It pissed Merle off when they had to share a bed, and, really, what eighteen-year-old had to share a bedroom with a three-year-old anyway? He could leave, sure, but after three stints in juvie and no prospect of a job, the shitty bedroom of the run down house was all he had.

Their father had upgraded them to a house—a shack, really—lost in the middle of the forest when he'd manage to scrimp some insurance money with an imaginary disability. Or maybe alcoholism and cowardice was a real pathology out there; Merle couldn’t tell.

The first two years after Daryl was born, he had still been small enough to sleep in the drawer of the shoddy dresser, so it hadn't been a problem. But then, the kid had started moving around too much and had soon outgrown it, even if he was small for his age.

So, Daryl had come to share Merle's bed, and Daryl's skin was always like a damn furnace. Even in winter, the kid was always hot to the touch. Their mother was always convinced he had a fever and coddled the kid all the damn time, but stopped rather abruptly the day Daryl had scratched her so badly on the cheek she now harbored scars of the imprint of his small, sharp nails.

Merle didn't know what to think of Daryl's apparent innate hatred for their mother. Some days, Merle even thought the kid resented her for giving birth to him, but some days, Merle could catch the slight glint of satisfaction when Daryl was the reason for making her cry.

0

Down the forest road, in her old wooden faded pink house they had to pass to go to town, old Mrs. Harper always spat on the ground and made the sign of the cross on her chest when she saw Daryl. She called him the devil's spawn and screamed Bible verses after them all the way to town.

Merle didn't know what to make of that, or the wide berth everyone gave Daryl when they walked the streets. Merle had found a job in a local biker bar two towns over and refused to leave Daryl with their parents when he wasn't there. He'd tried to straighten out his act some after Daryl was born, knowing somewhere deep inside his little brother didn't stand a chance in life alone. Merle didn't want him to become bitter about the world at an early age like him. 

At three, Daryl was small, blond and quiet. He observed the world and never talked to anyone except Merle.

At first, Merle had found some twisted satisfaction at Daryl's refusal to even talk to their mom, but quickly found it creepy and _wrongwrongwrong_. As he aged, Daryl's proclivity to hurt their mother was becoming more vicious. He didn't have anything to do with their father, maybe sensing he wasn't up to the challenge ( _yet_ , a voice screamed in Merle's head everyday), but Daryl relished in making their mom miserable.

Merle bartended at the local dive bar, sometimes having to throw out assholes that got too handsy with the ladies. Daryl generally sat on a barstool at the far right of the bar, coloring silently with his legs tucked under his bum as he was too small to reach the counter. Merle's boss didn't seem to care one way or the other, and actually seemed to enjoy Daryl's quiet nature and hard stare. The girls loved Merle's baby brother, and some of the regulars even greeted Daryl with a playful fist bump when they came in.

It wasn't the best environment for a little kid, but Merle was doing his best.

Daryl was five the day a brawl broke out in the bar. A man made a pass at some skank, and her boyfriend from a rival gang didn't appreciate anyone touching his property. At least twenty burly men started to launch themselves into the fray, regardless of where they stood on the right or wrongness of the initial offense. Merle was making his way with some difficulty through the mass of bodies, taking more than one lick for his effort, as he tried to reach Daryl.

He found his brother sitting on the bar, dangling his legs back and forth and watching the violence unfold with an interested expression on his habitually passive face.

Merle grabbed him in his arms, quickly exiting the bar using the backdoor, carrying Daryl to his old blue pick-up, and drove home. On the way there, Daryl turned to stare at Merle—not meeting his eyes, _never_ meeting anyone's eyes—and giggled once. "I didn' mean ta pinch tha' girl's ass."

Merle blinked at him, _knew the lie,_ and tightened his hands on the cracked leather of the steering wheel. "Then why did ya?" he heard himself ask in the quiet of the truck.

Daryl giggled again and turned his head in disinterest to look outside. "I want'd t'see wha'd happen," he answered much later, tucking his thumb into his mouth.

Merle heard the day after that three men died that night, two stabbed to death and one beaten to a bloody pulp.

Mrs. Harper's voice echoed in his head for a long time after that. _Devil's spawn_ …

0

It was the day their mother died in that suspicious house fire that Merle really started to question if there was maybe something really wrong with his much younger brother.

Daryl was six and Merle was twenty-three, acting more as the boy’s father than his brother since his birth. People from town had heard and like brainless sycophants, came running like rabid dogs to see the Dixon's fall.

Merle genuinely regretted the loss of the house, despite its drafts and shadiness, it still had been at least ten times better than the trailer. He felt a pang of sadness over his mother's death, but guessed she had it coming. The woman wasn't really all there anymore, hadn't been for some years now (since Daryl's birth, probably), but still…she'd been an important figure in Merle's youth, at least. She was weak and a bad mother, but she was still kin, she was still the woman who gave birth to him.

Next to him, Daryl was holding his hand and sucking his thumb as the watched the house burn.

The kid looked at the firefighters with an impassive face that only twisted slightly when the paramedics rolled down the gurney holding their dead mother's charred remains. His eyes were narrowed like always, two blue orbs sharp and dangerous against his tanned face, and Merle pinched his lips, looking away.

Their dad was standing a few feet away lamenting about his lost house more than his lost wife, threatening the police officers about house defect and criminal arson—in hopes of accessing the insurance money most likely.

Merle didn't care, he grabbed Daryl in his arms and walked out into the forest. He needed to get away from this hell.

Daryl's skin was too hot so close to the fire.

0

Merle was awarded full custody of Daryl three months later. He opened his own garage, and was able to make an honest living for himself. Even with Daryl and him living in the small but functional two-bedroom apartment above the garage. 

Daryl still slept with him most nights, but it was a place they could call home and where Daryl didn't get new scars on his back to add to the collection. Merle had been an asshole most of his life, but his little brother was too important not to get a hold of himself. The new setting seemed to suit Daryl rather well, and after the first six months, CPS stopped banging at their door every other damn day.

There was a lull of about several months before Merle got a call at work one day from Daryl's school telling him they wanted to meet with him. He told Lou, one of his employees, that he needed to go sort out some family business, leaving the garage in the man's very capable hands.

When he arrived in his coveralls, dirt still under his nails, he felt slightly out of place. He quickly smothered the feeling when he saw two very pissed-off parents sitting with a small boy between them, holding a blood-stained Kleenex to his nose. The boy was whimpering while his mother's cooed and smothered him with hugs and kisses. Merle nearly sneered but instead turned around, noticing his little brother's hunched position on the opposite chair.

He felt anger in that moment, the teachers, or whoever took care of the situation, left Daryl alone to face two angry parents. He didn't need a master's degree to know what happened, and rubbed his face at the additional problem.

He caught the side of Daryl's face and his fists tightened at the sight of the split lip.

                                                                                          

The door on the left suddenly opened, and the school's principal walked over to them, pinched lips, angry frown, clicking heels, and too-clean suit pegging her as the alpha bitch around this place.

Merle had met her the first day Daryl started sixth grade and listened to her redundant speech on equality of chances for children with a less privileged background, but quickly came to find her as annoying as her words.

Merle felt a bit disappointed that Daryl's teacher wasn't even present, her, he actually liked. Miss Phelps took great care of Daryl, knew he had a shitty background and hadn't nailed him as the trouble child on his first day. Even Daryl seemed to like her—well, as much as he could like someone who wasn't Merle—but still, it counted for something.

They all sat in the office, diplomas on child psychology and development displayed on her walls, as well as the picture of her perfect family (a girl, a boy, a husband with a strong jaw and the mandatory Labrador) sitting on the shelf behind her left shoulder. The contrast of the tidy office and Merle’s work attire only adding to his discomfort at being put in this position.

"Mr. Dixon," she started, red manicured hands folded in front of her and condescending smirk on her lips, "I have summoned you here today at the request of Mr. and Mrs. Sanders about Daryl's behavior and act of violence toward Timothy."        

Merle stared sideways at the vindicated couple and licked his lips. "What did he do?" he asked curtly.

The principal—Mrs. Pears (who actually _looked_ like a real pear)—slowly turned her head to him and gave him what Merle could only interpret as condescending and smug. "Daryl has been known to bully Timothy, and today, he punched him in the nose." 

Merle lifted an eyebrow. "Really? Why did he punch 'im?" he asked coldly.

Mrs. Pears tightened her lips but the father next to him snorted angrily. "The boy doesn't seem to need a reason. He's a bully, he just punched him."

Merle turned to stare at the man. "My lil' brother don't do nuthin' unprovok'd," he denied, "your kid musta’ done sumthin' ta him."

He saw the disgust on their faces at his accent (—white piece of trash, no good to raise a child—) but ignored it and turned to the principal. "Ask the kids 'ere. Let 'em talk."

The parents protested; the principal looked ready to deny Merle's request, but she must have seen the anger building in Merle's eyes, because she nodded and gave a brittle smile to the Sanders. "Let's try to be diplomatic about this, shall we? Mr. Dixon has a point, _the boy_ deserves a chance to explain his side."

Merle hated the way she referred to Daryl as _'the boy'_ but kept quiet and watched the woman stand and walk to the door, asking the children to enter. Timothy immediately ran to his parents, whining about being tired and wanting to go home, answered with an, ‘ _of course honey, you can have hot chocolate and watch anything you want on TV_.’ Meanwhile, Daryl quietly walked to Merle, feather-light step carrying him slowly to his brother's side.

Merle saw the Sanders' sneers at the sight of Daryl's clothes, they fit but they were cheap. Merle didn't believe in fancy and expensive clothes when Daryl would outgrow them in a matter of months, most likely destroying them before he even got the chance. A decent pair of blue jeans, a plaid button-up shirt and a strong pair of boots wasn’t just economical, but sensible.

Sure, it screamed redneck, but Merle didn't care. Daryl fit well in their world, and Merle refused to make his little brother something he wasn't. Besides, Daryl hated wearing fancy clothes and would either rip them on their hunting trips or stain them irreparably while playing around the garage.     

Merle felt Daryl climb on his lap and automatically wrapped an arm around his skinny waist before looking back at the pinched face of the principal.

"Daryl," she started slowly, as if talking to someone particularly slow and stupid and probably believing she was right, "do you understand why we had to ask your brother to come to school today?"

Daryl stared at her mutely and nodded, he still wasn't a big talker. He talked at school when he had to and to avoid getting them in trouble with CPS, but Merle knew if it was up to his little brother, Daryl probably wouldn't talk at all. He dreaded his adult years, sure the moment he no longer felt he had to, Daryl would stop talking entirely.

"A vocal answer is more polite, Daryl," Mrs. Pears admonished more harshly than she would have talked to any other child.

Merle felt Daryl stiffen with building irritation and gently squeezed his waist. "Yes, m'am," Daryl answered hoarsely.

Daryl's voice had always been deeper than his age, broken in some places for lack of use and sweetened with a gravelly southern accent. It generally sent shivers down Merle's spine because it wasn't the voice of a little boy. He saw Mrs. Pears shift uncomfortably in her leather seat and could tell the woman was unsettled by it as well.

His little brother’s body was like a furnace against his already too warm coveralls, damn near burning a hole in his lap, searing through his sleeve at the point of contact. _Devil's spawn_ , came to mind flittingly. _He's burning like hell's flames_ , Mrs. Harper used to hiss in their mother's ears like a snake, probably helping to drive the woman insane.

"Well, do tell us." She prompted impatiently.

Daryl leaned forward abruptly and jerked his head to the side to stare intensely at Timothy, making the other boy whimper in fright and curl up against his mother. Daryl straightened back up and turned slowly to stare at the principal. "I guess I jus' lost my temper when he went an’ called me a redneck piece o' white trash."

The room was quiet for a stunned moment before Timothy started to cry. "He's lying! I—I—I didn't say that!"

Daryl blinked slowly and stared at his classmate sideways, head tilted to the side. "Ya pissed on my bag and ya had it comin'," he leaned back toward the kid with a smirk. "I warn'd ya."

Merle choked on his breath, trying his best not to laugh as the two parents stare at their child in bewilderment. Regaining his wits, Merle turned to stare at the principal. "Ya gonna tell me my lil' brother pissed on his own bag?" he asked in what he hoped was a threatening tone.

He saw the woman blanch slightly before blushing, hands grasping at anything on her desk to re-center herself, fiddling with papers like people always do when they wanted to change subject with all their might, before looking at Timothy in disappointment. "Timothy, I am awfully disappointed by your behavior."

Timothy started to cry in earnest now. "I didn't! I swear!"

Merle sniffed and glared at the parents. "And he's lyin', too? Who's bullying who, huh?" he snapped. "My brother felt he needed ta defend himself 'n y’all go accusin' him of hurtin' your kid after what _he_ done?"

Timothy’s parent's faces reddened, the father muttering some piss-poor excuses to the principal. Merle turned to look at the woman. "So, what's gonna be his punishment?" 

Mrs. Pears looked taken aback, clearly never having intended for the situation to take such a U-turn and shook her head. "Really, the situation isn't that desperate," she said with a small, nervous laugh, Timothy's crying still loud as he continued to plead and beg his now angry parents. "I'm sure Timothy understands the gravity of his behavior and his parents will accordingly decide on a punishment at home." 

Merle gave a nod, nearly feeling a little remorse for the kid as his parent's turned on him. They were disappointed sure, but the boy was still more hurt than Daryl and deserved some kind of compassion. They were just children and really, if it hadn't come to the principal's office he would have found the situation hilarious.

Daryl was quiet, observing the chaos with that familiar _interested_ look. The same look as a year ago during the brawl at the bar, the same look as nine months ago when their house burnt down.

Mrs. Sanders finally turned to look at Merle, her gaze shifting to Daryl's impassive face and contritely shook her head. "We'll pay for the furniture damaged by Timothy's _awful behavior_ ," she told them, turning a glare at her son with her last words. "We'll buy a new bag, of course."

Merle nodded mutely and stood taking Daryl's small, burning hand after sending the principal one last look. As they passed the threshold, Daryl turned and stared at Mrs. Sanders. "Black," he informed flatly. "For my new bag." He added, as they looked at him confused.

Merle felt that ever-persisting shiver run down his spine and reminded himself Daryl was just six and surely couldn't possibly be that cunning.

0      

Merle had read somewhere that every known psychopathic murderer got their start killing animals in their youth.

He wasn’t sure if hunting could be a point of reference or not, but Daryl had become a skilled hunter when he was just barely ten. Merle knew grown men who couldn't shoot a buck as lethally and precisely as his baby brother. 

There was always an air of tranquil stillness around Daryl when he hunted. His eyes— _always cold, always so icy blue, never looking you straight in the eyes_ —never left his prey.

Daryl liked the thrill of killing, skinning, then eating his game afterward.

Merle just couldn’t be sure.

Finally he decided reading a stupid book on psychology just wasn't for him, and only served to exacerbate his rampant paranoia, a lingering effect of the meth he used to smoke when he was younger. 

Ignorance, after all, was bliss.

But when old Mrs. Harper started shrieking about her disappearing cats… Merle had to wonder.

0

Merle knew something was definitely wrong with his baby brother when Daryl came back from a walk in the forest one day covered in blood. No weapons, no knives, no crossbow.

Daryl was fifteen, and starting to look like the man he'd one day become. He was still rather small, he'd never have the height of his father or brother, but that was okay. He was a lean fucker, and all muscles. There wasn't an ounce of fat on his bones, and he could pack a mean punch. Merle had decided to enroll him in some sports a few years back, and while Daryl had been great at handling a baseball bat, the other kid who received it (accidently) in the face hadn't agreed. Thus ending Daryl's short but intense sports career.

His hands dripped with blood and his clothes reeked of iron, and Merle felt a hopeless moment of panic. Because the first thing that crossed his mind wasn't _'are you hurt?'_ but _'what did you kill?'_

Daryl was staring at him, blood-covered body taut, his face and eyes calmer than Merle had ever seen. The last time he remembered seeing Daryl so peaceful had been after the fire. And, suddenly, it clicked. The things Merle had refused to see, the things Merle had refused to acknowledge about his baby brother.

He pushed Daryl into the shower, scrubbed him down until his skin was lobster red (instead of stained blood red), took his clothes and burnt them behind the house.

Merle had bought the place after business had flourished at the garage, the forest surrounding them enough to provide them with regular meals and the seclusion the Dixon brothers aspired to. Merle had never been so thankful for the lack of neighbors in a three-mile radius than he was when burning his brother’s clothes.

Daryl was sitting on the porch, smoking calmly when Merle came back and sat heavily next to him, rubbing his face. "Do I need ta prepare for the cops knockin' down the door?" he grunted.

Daryl smirked slightly around his cigarette and never answered, smoke surrounding him and blurring Merle's vision of his brother. 

Merle grabbed a cigarette but didn't light it up.

He'd been wrong.

Now he hated his mother _even_ more.

Then he shuddered, because he didn't know if his hated for her had double over what she tried to do to the baby in her belly, or for failing to do so.

0

Not long after Daryl's birth and witnessing the baby's repeated (un)conscious assault on their mother since coming to this world, Merle wondered if it wasn't his parent's fault. If it wasn't because they were so rotten to the core when they created the baby that it stained Daryl's soul.

There were times when Daryl had been small, still retaining some natural childlike curiosity about life, (not the perverse interest he showed when watching the house burn or people dying in a bar fight) but about things around him. He asked Merle about the night he was born, and the time he was still in their mother's womb.

There was always that bland and empty amusement about it that Merle always found unsettling, as if Daryl already knew but liked to hear it.

He told Daryl he didn't move at all during the pregnancy. He had been a silent baby and been thought stillborn more than once. At the first and only echography their mother went and dragged Merle to, they saw a curled up baby with its thumb in his mouth, heartbeat slower than usual and eyes visibly opened.

They never went back—his mother couldn't stand to see the thing she had in her belly, already knowing something was terribly wrong with it. Maybe her several attempts to get rid of the baby she carried was part of the reason she went crazy in the end.

Some days, Merle wondered if in fact, nothing had been wrong at all, and if it wasn't all those attempts on his as yet unlived-life and hits to her gut that had been the reason Daryl was the way he was today.

He would never know for sure, and didn't think he wanted to. Didn't want to think about 'what ifs' and wonder what would have happened if his baby brother wasn't the way he was. 

Merle would tell Daryl of the night he was born, how the sky opened up with lightening and heavy rain—like God's ire, like the Man upstairs didn't approve of this particular birth.

Then he would tell Daryl how it was so hot, they all felt like hell was closer than usual—how his skin had burnt their mother’s all the way out.

Daryl always looked satisfied at the story, scorching hands gently holding Merle's wrist.

Some days Merle wondered if he imagined the red marks left on his skin, like branded imprints of tiny hands.  

0 

Merle wondered every once in a while if his daddy was even the same as Daryl's.

He remembered people whispering around them and pointing accusing fingers at the small boy, always holding his hand and hearing them mutter about how they didn't look alike at all.

Merle was burly, tall, had jet-black hair and was thick-boned.

Daryl was delicate looking, small, blond nearly white (ashes) and lean.

Their only shared trait were their eyes, but even they held distinct differences. Merle's were a tad on the darker side, 'warm' he heard his mother say one day. Paradoxically, Daryl's eyes were the color of ice, cold and unflinching, even when he'd never looked anyone in the eyes.

It scared people to talk to someone who only stared at their mouths. Like Daryl could see their lies pouring out.

0

Daryl loved Merle. It was life. It was fact. His blood who was his brother, who was his father.

Some days Merle knew it, saw it and felt it in his very bones.

Other days he wondered, because Daryl looked so far away, so untouchable, Merle wondered what the kid was looking at, or if his head was tilted on the side, if he was listening to someone only he could hear. 

Daryl's skin was so hot sometimes, Merle swore he could see steam raise off of him when it rained. 

0

Their mother used to drag them to church every Sunday once Daryl was old enough to walk—until the fire, in fact.

Merle used to ask himself if the house burning down had really been an accident. He wondered if the last thing his mother saw was a pair of icy blue eyes, and knew it was the truth the day he saw Daryl burn a Bible.  

Daryl had hated church viscerally.

Merle remembered their mother always staying back after mass, hand wrapped around Daryl's bird thin wrist, her nails digging in the fragile skin and begging the priest for guidance, for help.

One day, after Merle was gone for three weeks with his biker gang, he came back to his father passed out on the couch, bottles scattered around him but no Ma and no Daryl.

He drove to Mrs. Harper's pink faded house and walked in uninvited because he just _knew_. The woman had been pouring lies in his mother's ears since Daryl's birth, and knew to come here. Several women were kneeling around a circle drawn in chalk on the hardwood floor, candles burning his retinas and his mother holding her crucifix in a white knuckled grip, muttering prayers of exorcism under her fevered breath. 

Merle ignored the fear, ignored the downright terror he felt in his blood when he grabbed his little brother out of the drawn circle, drenched in holy water and stinking of sage, twisting and writhing as moans and groans ripped out of his throat with a voice too deep to belong to such a small boy. 

He heard the women scream, his mother's words following him to the truck and into the night, into the forest. " _And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. He's the devil's spawn!_ "

Merle quickly tuned her words out and concentrated on Daryl's sobs. Little boy sobs, his sweet voice calling for Merle's help and love.

Merle didn't know what it made him—Satan's trusted lieutenant? Persephone's cherished nanny? He couldn't bring himself to care. Daryl was a baby, tiny and fragile, he needed him.

He needed his brother who was his father. 

Merle wondered how long that'd last. 

0

Merle didn't ignore it, couldn't in fact, when it glared at him so obviously in the face. It was too dangerous not to acknowledge it, and while he had been a champion at selecting the reality he accepted for many years, he couldn't apply it to this case.

It was the night that he heard someone talking about Mrs. Harper’s murder as he was sitting at the bar in town nursing a beer that he knew for sure, and he wondered if she was the first human life his little brother had taken. Had to be, really, Merle’d never really let Daryl out of his sight before he was around fifteen. The kid was independent, solitary, and didn't like anyone gravitating too close around him, but he never seemed to mind Merle's quiet hovering.

The details of Mrs. Harper’s demise were gruesome and savage, the old woman had been found nailed to her cracked and faded pink walls, gutted like an animal.

He gulped down two shots of whisky and listened to people speculate as to who could be crazy enough to do that to an old lady.

Merle took a leaf from Daryl's book and stayed mute.  

0

As far as Merle knew, Daryl had never been with a girl before. It wasn't the sort of thing he wanted to acknowledge about his baby brother, couldn't stop seeing the small blond kid running around the forest with his laugh echoing around the trees.

Daryl started working alongside his older brother in the garage after he dropped out of school on a whim.

The kid was brilliant, had a way with words and numbers that impressed even Merle's usual disinterest in academic prowess, but he got tired of hanging around the other kids, hearing their slurs and getting disciplined for retaliating against them.

Like a lot of things Daryl put his mind to, he mastered mechanics like a pro, outdoing Merle in just a few months. Although he always seemed to disappear when someone came to the shop to ask for repairs. He would work on the cars silently, but he refused anything that resembled social interaction.

He didn't speak to Lou at all, even if he had known him for years and worked with him every day. Lou didn't seem to mind, pegged Daryl's surly attitude as part of being a teenager. Merle didn't really have the heart to tell him Daryl wasn't being rude, but _really_ didn't like him or anyone else in this world.

Daryl's hair had gone darker as he aged, as if being white-blond and tanned like Daryl was, had been too strange, especially with those blue eyes. Merle was glad for that, even if Daryl had a streak of ash-blond hair around his left temple. Merle tried to cut it out, shave it, and leave Daryl with a bald spot on his head. He once even tried to dye it black, but it always came back. He finally stopped trying to tamper with it when Daryl threatened to make him eat the dye. 

Working at the garage seemed to offer Daryl some peace of mind he'd never been able to reach at school. It seemed Daryl liked to be around Merle all day, and he was glad his presence was enough to make his little brother feel safe. 

Daryl had always been tactile with Merle, he guessed his baby brother was compensating for something, probably the fact he never let anyone else touch him. It seemed like on some deep subconscious level, knew he had been an unwanted child.

Some nights, Merle was still woken up by the feeling of Daryl slipping under his sheets even if they were far too old for that shit now. He never questioned it and just let his brother rest his head under his chin, ear plastered to his chest. 

During the summer months, it was difficult to stand as he sweat buckets through the night. He took to sleeping in his briefs, even having a cold shower every morning, but he never pushed Daryl away. He reckoned he needed his little brother's presence as much as him, if not more. 

Lou tried tirelessly to engage Daryl in conversation every day. Merle caught Daryl's infuriated look more than once and wondered if his annoyance was enough to upset the fragile peace that had fallen upon his little brother's mind. He hadn't seen Daryl come back covered in blood since Mrs. Harper's death three years ago, but he had taken to hunting twice as much.

Merle didn't care. If hunting was enough to satisfy his rampant urges, then he couldn't (wouldn't) fault him. 

He'd rather pay hundreds of dollars in fines for his brother hunting off-season than visiting the kid in prison every other week. He wondered if the cops would investigate the death of their mother. If one day, they would find out what Daryl did to the old witch and see it in a brand new light. That maybe they'd look into it and see the fire wasn't accidental. 

People had never questioned their mother’s death.

She was known to talk to herself, as well as for drinking and smoking too much. She had given birth to a strange child, but he guessed the cops didn't want to hear about redneck folklore. Cops didn't believe in innate evilness anyhow. They believed that what people were or had become was because of their environment, bad choices and bad childhood, but they still wanted to believe in the goodness of people.

Somewhere, deep down, Merle didn't believe it. He’d been witness to the contrary for eighteen years now. He wouldn't trade his baby brother for all the gold in the world, but he knew babies could be born evil.  

0 

Before he knew it, Merle's business (Daryl's too, now) thrived and he had to hire two more mechanics.

Mike and Walter took care of the newer model cars, like those fancy Germans Merc' or BMW that were more electronics than mechanics. Lou, Merle and Daryl took care of renovating older models, flipping them for thousands of dollars more than they had been worth when they rolled in.

Daryl developed a liking for older bikes and soon became Georgia's most sought-after bike professional. Even the boys from the local Hells Angels branch came at least once a month for some repair, but also because they seemed to like Daryl, even if the kid watched them placidly and only seemed interested in their rides. 

Merle figured they liked his brother because Daryl didn't seem to fear them.

Merle didn't either, but it was more because he learnt never to show fear, from his Daddy, from his teachers, from the cops, from them pig guards back in juvie (—from Daryl—) than any conscious thought. Merle had his pride and knew not to look weak in front of anybody. He wouldn't have been able to raise a kid like Daryl if he'd been weak. He wouldn't say he thanked his Daddy for those scars and fists—he wasn't that stupid or masochistic—but anyone else would have drowned Daryl in the first years of his life, or abandoned him in the forest. 

Hell, anyone would have thrown Daryl in the loony bin the moment he started showing all those strange quirks. 

So, Daryl stared down any biker three times bigger than him without blinking, and they were smart enough not to engage him in any spat. He guessed dogs could smell the danger of any alpha wolf hiding under pretty looks. They had to smell it every time Daryl looked at their faces with ice in his veins, eyes fixed on their mouths. He didn't take shit from anyone, not even Merle, and he never backed down. 

Daryl listened to Merle and followed his lead, not because he submitted to him, but because he wanted to. Merle wasn't stupid enough to underestimate Daryl. The kid could take him out before he even realized it was too late. Merle always knew it was a possibility—just as he knew to his very bones and soul that Daryl would never hurt him. 

Girls were a different matter. 

Merle never was picky with them, and he had to admit living as well-off as they did now with such a successful business was real honey for all those little bees. Their house in the forest was still in dire need of work, but it was something the brothers enjoyed doing in their spare time. They weren't the type to have someone else do the work for them; it just wasn't how they saw life. For them, if you didn't get what you needed yourself, then you didn't deserve it. 

Girls gravitated to the garage, batting their lashes, showing too much cleavage and giggling inanely. They always seemed to travel in packs like hyenas, but Merle didn't really care. As long as he could get his rocks off a couple of times a week that was fine by him. 

Daryl just ignored them. Hell, he ignored just about everyone, but he was particularly impassive to women's charms, and while Merle didn't want a queer brother, well, he would find it healthier for Daryl if he'd been checking out men rather than nothing. 

Daryl never talked about it, and Merle never heard him brag about it like the boys at the garage, or at the bar, or like he himself sometimes did. 

It was a rather slow day and Merle was bored. Mike and Walt had the day off, Lou was God knows where, and Daryl was taking care of an old Triumph he'd found somewhere and brought back. There was more rust than metal on the thing but Daryl always did love a lost cause. 

Merle looked up from his beer when he heard a car backfire, quickly followed by cursing and swearing.

He lifted an eyebrow when he saw a chick with bleach blond hair open the driver’s side door and kick it angrily. She had the shortest pair of jean shorts Merle had ever seen, giving everyone a perfect view of her pink thong and a white shirt knotted under her ample fake breasts. The shirt was purposely see-through to show a bra the same color as the thong she so proudly displayed.

She was nearly repulsively raunchy to look at, the type of easy lay Merle always preferred. He wasn't the wooing type, didn't have a romantic bone in his body and didn't feel any urge to settle down. Didn't think he'd ever want to in fact, he was happy with his life just the way it was. 

She was sneering at her white BMW, probably a gift from Daddy who didn't know his little girl dressed like a slut every time she was out of his sight. She probably went to church on Sundays with her family and wore a chastity ring or some shit, even if she'd been spreading her legs since high school for the entire football team. 

She strutted into the garage, chewing loudly with an exaggerated work of her jaw and looked Merle up and down over the rim of her sunglasses, big enough to almost cover her whole face. 

"Hi, sugar," Merle grinned, leering at her. "Trouble?" 

She lifted a perfectly plucked eyebrow and snapped her gum. "Maybeee," she gushed and flicked her hair over her shoulder, throwing Merle a whiff of expensive perfume. It was probably one of those tiny bottles that cost more than was really necessary, if the nauseous flowery scent was any indication. 

Merle observed her a moment before looking over her shoulder, making her twirl around in surprise and smack her face right into Daryl's chest like a brick wall. He didn't move an inch, looking at her down his nose with his hard eyes. 

The bimbo squeaked and chuckled nervously at Daryl's unexpected closeness. She took a step away from him, taking in his marine coveralls wrapped at his waist, grime smudged wife beater showing his tan, muscled arms and flat abdomen.

For all the beer he drank, Merle found it unfair Daryl still kept his figure. The kid was athletic, but he didn't go out of his way like Walt who lifted weights every day. He wasn't jealous of Daryl because he accepted a long time ago his brother had gotten the looks and the brains in the family. 

Merle wasn't an idiot, but he was far from Daryl's league, and he knew some of the ladies he brought back home were sometimes more interested by the younger Dixon, following him in the hopes to get a piece of Daryl. It never happened, but Merle found it rather funny to pop their fantasy bubble and get laid in the same night. 

Blondie licked at her lips suggestively, probably lapping at that disgusting gloss she’d painted on, and took off her sunglasses. "Hi, honey, maybe _you_ can help me." 

Merle leaned against the hood of a blue Prius and snorted, watching and enjoying her make a fool of herself. Daryl kept staring, unmoving and mute and Merle saw the girl falter a moment, not used to having her charms rebuked so violently. 

Passive violence and mind games. That was Daryl in a nutshell. 

"It's the exhaust pipe," Daryl muttered to Merle after a while, transferring his complete disinterest for the girl to his brother. The younger Dixon turned his head to look at him over hers and Merle felt he had to intervene. "Well, let's have a look," he muttered, no longer amused by her attitude.

There was no bimbo in the world worthy of his baby brother’s attention.

She followed them to the car, her varnished white platform heels giving her a funny gait on the unsteady dusty ground. She nearly tripped once but got her bearings by gripping Daryl's forearm, digging her sharp manicured nails into his skin. Daryl jerked, hissing under his breath and stepped away from her. 

Merle's steps nearly faltered, but only looked at his brother at corner of his eyes, assessing his state of mind. Daryl's temper always seemed to titter on the edge every time someone touched him unexpectedly or without his permission. 

The girl was pretty much lost already— _burnt_ —and Merle felt that familiar prickle run down his spine. He hoped to be able to divert Daryl's attention with the car, maybe save him from going over the edge this time, calm him down, offer him the peace he needed to stop that voice from scraping the inside of his skull. 

Daryl told him once about the voices whispering things in his head, sometimes getting so loud he couldn't hear himself think. Merle wished he could contain it, hopefully in time, before Daryl slipped again. 

0

It didn't always work, and it certainly didn't this time. Merle nearly lost his lunch when the cops came knocking down the garage door and told him a girl from Atlanta had been found dead at the exit of town, car abandoned on the side of the road and body broken and torn to shreds. They had found her a few feet down the ravine, she'd been raped, mutilated, and decapitated by her attacker.

He told the cop she'd come to get her car fixed the day before, but that he didn't see her after that.

The cops believed him—of course they did, he'd come clean and honest for a while now—but then they asked to talk to Daryl. He nodded but told them his brother was a town over getting parts for the new bike. They asked for their address and told him they'd be over in the evening.

He closed the shop three hours earlier and paced the length of the house until Daryl came back.

The kid looked calm, so fucking calm Merle nearly threw up again.

"Daryl," he began with a slightly trembling voice, pushing him to sit gently on the couch as he sat on the coffee table facing him, "Daryl…that girl…who came to the garage… She's dead. The cops are asking around."

Daryl stared and stared and stared _into his eyes_ and Merle wished he wouldn't, even if he'd begged Daryl to look at him in the eyes most of his life.

And Daryl shrugged. "She screamed pretty." _And smiled_.

                                                                                          

Merle stood and walked to the kitchen, losing his meal in the sink.

 _He knew_.

 _Had known_ all his life but it was the first time Daryl up and _told_ him right to his face. It almost felt like betrayal, like his whole life was a lie.

It was a shock and his chuckle was brittle when Daryl—skin always so _hothothothot_ to the touch—plastered himself against his back, arms around his waist, Merle holding them both with his arms braced against the sink, rinsing the vomit and watching his meal go down, down, down the drain with a twirl.

"D'ya hate me now?" Daryl muttered against his back, forehead pressed between his shoulder blades.

Merle reached back and hugged Daryl backward, wrapping his hands at the small of Daryl's back. "I could never hate ya, baby brother," he murmured. 

Daryl hummed. "Sum'times they get so loud," he sighed.

Merle didn't need to ask who _they_ were. The voices, the ones that made Daryl what he was. Maybe Merle had been wrong all those years ago when he decided to stop reading those medical books. Daryl was psychotic but mostly functional and could hide it well. He didn’t seem to have the cliché need to display his kills that most serial killers had, ultimately leading them to their downfall. 

Merle remembered a very long time ago when Daryl came back from a walk into the forest with a dripping dog's head in his small hands, big toothy grin blinding in its horror and innocence. _"Look what I did, Mer'!"_

 _'Look what I did_ ' screamed at him through Mrs. Harper's crucified corpse, their mother's charred remains and that slutty decapitated girl from Atlanta.

He figured he should consider himself lucky this seemed to be the _only_ collateral damages to Daryl's unpredictable madness. His kills were few and far-between, maybe they could work around that. Maybe they could find a permanent solution, some kind of deal…

"Daryl, ya need ta tell me when ya need to do that. Ya need to tell me so I can…do sum'thin' 'bout the…bodies, yeah?" He took a deep breath. "Cops're comin' tonight, they wanted ta talk ta ya. They already asked me questions this afternoon but they wanted to talk ta ya anyway."

Daryl hummed and rubbed his cheek against Merle's back. "Don't like ta talk," he muttered.

Merle sighed and patted his back gently. "I know." He licked his lips. "Daryl, d'ya promise ta tell me?"

He felt Daryl shift slightly behind him before the kid nodded. "I promise, Mer'."

The nickname, the words…

It was enough for Merle.

It had to be.

0

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own The Walking Dead. I borrowed parts of Doctor Who script from series 8, parts from Buffy The Vampire Slayer, parts from Law & Order: SVU (S07 E22 Influence), part of lyrics Fuck U by Archive, and In der Palästra by Sopor Aeternus. This story is also greatly inspired by the movie Red Canyon starring Norman Reedus. Thanks to Jayswing for her editing work. She's also on tumblr under the name ofcoltsandcrossbows
> 
> The title of this work is from Fever Ray 'If I Had A Heart'


	2. If I had a voice I would sing

0

_Devil's spawn…_

He didn't believe in God and wished he didn't believe in Satan, but sometimes he couldn't help it. 

It wasn't the mutilation, or the cut head, or the crucifixion, or the burnt house.

It was the rape that got him.

Merle wasn't tender, and more than once, the girls he had sex with complained about how rough he was, but he'd never downright hurt them like that.

For some irrational reason, he didn't want his baby brother to be a damn rapist. Those were the worst kind. And strangely enough, Merle had stupidly pictured Daryl's first time with a sweet girl he liked and maybe the sex being about feelings rather than need to release pent-up rage.

To think he'd been so ignorant about his brother's depravity was a rather bitter pill to swallow.

Was she the first?

Probably not, because the cops had no lead about the murder or the rape, and Daryl had an iron-clad alibi.

How did he even do that?    

0

It occurred to Merle that Daryl didn't seem capable of _liking_ anything. 

He loved Merle, of course; it was life, it was fact. But his little brother didn't have any particular _liking_. For example, for food or music or color.

He ate just about anything available, they didn't owe a stereo so the only music they heard was the one at the bars they frequented and Merle found out in Daryl's early years that he didn't see colors because he was colorblind—just shades of gray. So, fashion was a moot point because as long as he had a shirt, a pair of pants and boots, the boy was happy like a fish. 

0

It snowed that winter. 

Daryl was pacing back and forth on the porch like an angry cat, sneering and gnawing at his thumb in huffy annoyance. The wings of his leather jacket seemed to shift and move along the muscles of his back, following his movement. Smoke followed him and billowed around him like an angry white cloud twirling around his head as he smoked cigarette after cigarette, inhaling deeply on them like a junkie needing his fix. 

If Merle couldn't tell what Daryl liked, he could tell what he hated. 

Snow was somewhere high on the list, just under physical contact and people. 

The fact Daryl's skin was so hot made him just all the more sensible to the cold.

He could stand the roasting summers of the Appalachians, but he couldn't stand the harsh winters, fuckin' furnace that he was. It always made him more vulnerable, more on the edge, maybe more fragile. Daryl never showed weakness, but he seemed almost mellowed during the cold season, like he ran out of steam during summer and needed a reload. 

Merle sat on the bench sitting against the house and smoked his own cigarette as Daryl suddenly threw himself in the rocking chair and wrapped his old poncho around him. 

He seemed calmer suddenly, but Merle learnt a long time ago his brother was very unpredictable. He was very much like a bad tempered rattlesnake. You didn't see it pounce until it was already digging its fang into you. 

"Okay, lil' D?" he grunted around his smoke.

Daryl blinked slowly before tilting his head to eyeball him. He huffed and turned back to staring at the forest. Deep, calm, silent forest. And the snow. He tucked his nose into the poncho and Merle saw the trembling racking Daryl's body.

Why he stayed outside when he was this cold was Merle's guess since Daryl's childhood. 

Merle wondered if it wasn't some sort of self-harm. 

"T's fuckin' cold," he muttered after a while, face half-hidden by the poncho. 

Merle snorted. "'Course it is. T's winter, baby."

Daryl chuckled and ticked his tongue. "Don't call me that. 'M too old." Merle only smiled. Even if the boy was twenty or forty, he'd always be Merle's baby.

Daryl hummed and one of his hands snaked out of his warm cocoon to reach for the pack of smokes sitting on the small table at his elbow. "Didn' you've a date or some shit?"

Merle shrugged. "You know how it goes," he drawled, crossing his legs on the balustrade in front of him. "Ain't a big loss."

Daryl pursed his lips and chewed on the filter of his half smoked cigarette, gaze lost on the forest. On nothingness.

Merle wondered if someone was talking to him.

0

They never celebrated Christmas.

It'd be stupid to start the tradition. Merle never had one when his parents were still relatively sane. Then after Daryl was born, their mother was convinced she'd birthed the anti-Christ. She would feel it was blasphemous to celebrate the birth of Jesus. 

But they always celebrated birthdays. Back when Merle had blinded himself into believing Daryl was a normal little boy, he'd made a point to show his brother how he appreciated his venue to the world, and he kept to the ritual through the years.

Daryl was born the 31st of July, right into the middle of summer. Their daddy never went to declare his second son's birth, so Merle went and filled the birth certificate. He didn't put the right time because he couldn't remember but had been adamant about the date. 

So, they celebrated birthdays. And while Daryl was a summer baby, bright and burning, his older brother had been his opposite, born in February.

They generally went camping and hunting for a whole week during each other's birthday weeks. They never bought presents because they wouldn't really be appreciated apart from hunting equipment.

This year, Daryl got him two tickets for an old bike convention in Atlanta. He was happy, thought the change of scenery would do good for Daryl. Maybe getting him out of his solitary bubble would be benefic somehow. Show him a bit of the city, drown the voices a little bit.

Sometimes Merle wished to be right just once in his life.

0  

Merle unconsciously drew a line when Daryl was nine and nearly killed little Debbie Thomas.

Merle had been worried when he didn't see Daryl come back from school. He had walked into the forest using the old track he'd made a few years back for Daryl to cut through the forest, and got the fright of his life. His little brother was holding a heavy rock in his hands _over_ the crying little girl's head.

He'd ran, grabbed the rock and Daryl in one smooth motion and turned terrified eyes to the girl.

What was he going to do? What could he say so she wouldn't rat on Daryl to her parents?

He kept Daryl in his arms, but helped the girl stand, gently dusting her blue summer dress and chuckled nervously. "Hey, girlie," he stammered, "no need ta cry!" He felt Daryl's burning arms wrap around his neck and unconsciously tightened his own around his little brother when the little boy put his head on his shoulder. "See, me n' Daryl we like ta wrestle, like those big men on TV. I guess he forgot you was a girl!"

The little girl sniffed but giggled after a moment and the constricting fist squeezing Merle's heart relinquished a bit. "So, maybe we'll keep that a secret, hey?"

She nodded and rubbed her eyes with grubby hands. "Daryl said he wanted to play."

Merle swallowed with difficulty. "Yeah, yeah, t'was jus' a game."

He drove the little girl back home and explained uneasily to her mother that he found her lost in the woods. The Dixons didn't have such a good reputation, but Merle knew the girl's mother and Betty Thomas worked in the bar Merle used to bartend.

That evening he sat Daryl and watched the boy eat his dinner quietly, small legs dangling back and forth with his feet not even touching the floor yet.

"Daryl," he started seriously and smiled faintly when big curious blue eyes returned his stare. "Daryl, what you did today with Debbie…you can't do it again."

Daryl narrowed his eyes and frowned. "Why?"

Merle licked his lips and rubbed his face, no appetite and full plate sitting untouched in front of him. "Daryl, you can't hurt kids," he explained as calmly as he can. "That's…too dangerous. _People_ don't react well when kids're hurt. D'you understand?"

Daryl hummed lowly. "I guess."

Merle pressed a hand to his mouth. "Daryl, you have ta promise me ta _never_ hurt a kid."

The little boy looked at him emotionlessly. "Even when I'm big?"

Merle felt that familiar fear run up and down his spine. " _'specially_ when yer big."  

0

Biologically speaking there was nothing wrong with Daryl. Except for a higher core temperature.

While human body's temperature ran on an average 98.6 °F, Daryl's _normal_ temperature was about three degrees above, like he had a lifelong fever.

Daryl was never a sickly child, and the matter of his temperature only came to light because their mother panicked when he was a baby and thought he was dying.

Except Daryl was as healthy as a horse and no bug was stupid enough to try to get him.

0

Atlanta was big, and Merle came to regret taking Daryl there the minute they got out of the car. They crashed at some of Merle's friends back from the days, faded lines of coke, aluminum, and old syringes lying around the apartment and Daryl looking at the place aloofly, already missing the forest and wilderness.

Jake was nice but a meth head and could have a bad temper when under the influence. Merle sat on the couch with a beer, ignoring the man shooting himself up next to him, and observed Daryl on the armchair facing them.

The kid was smoking and silent, blue eyes sparkling with that strange glint as he stared at Jake veins changing color as the drug entered his system.

Merle regretted taking Daryl even more, but then his life only seemed just one long line of regrets. He could feel the air charge with that hot energy that always seemed to surround Daryl in those moments.

Jake was too lucid to miss his little brother's stare and chuckled. "Wanna try?" he asked, body already thrumming, empowered by the drug.

Daryl was staring at Jake _in the eyes_ , elbow up on the arm of the chair with his cigarette loosely dangling from his fingers, and Merle shifted, drank half of his bottle in one gulp and elbowed Jake. "C'mon, man, don't go give that shit ta my brother."   

Jake chuckled. "What about ya, Merle?"

Merle shook his head with a huff and grabbed a smoke from his pocket. "Ain't touched the shit inna while."

Jake hummed and sprawled lazily in the couch, spreading his legs in front of him, eyes still on Daryl. "Wanna try again?"

Merle shook his head and lit his cigarette. "Nah." And he was proud to say he hadn't felt the urge in years now. It'd been a condition to get Daryl's custody, and even when the kid had been eighteen and technically an adult, and they couldn't take him from him, Merle hadn't wanted to fall off the wagon.

He always thought he ought to have a clear mind when dealing with Daryl's…lapses.

"Hell, Merle, ya gone all nun on me?" Jake laughed with a rueful shake of his head.

Merle shrugged and stood. "Gonna grab 'nother beer," he said as he walked to the kitchen.

He saw the look in Daryl's eyes change when Jake proposed him drugs. His brother would never touch the thing—and for that, Merle thanked God, because he was crazy enough without drugs—but Daryl had a protective streak when it came to his big brother that occasionally even surpassed Merle's.

He leaned against the sink as he heard Jake laugh manically and Daryl answer more subtly, his unused voice low and gravely and scratched by smoke and booze.

He was rather relieved Jake wouldn't be missed by anyone but his dealer.

So he watched, ever attentive, how Daryl laid his trap slowly and methodically. The kid was really good. Not so obvious, not so openly _ferocious_. He was still a physical menace, but his new kind of danger was insidious now. He played head games like he breathed. It was unfolding like all those years ago in the principal's office with little Timothy.

Merle felt a shameful perverse satisfaction at watching Daryl undo Jake without the stupid fuck realizing he was already doomed.

Maybe Daryl's madness was contagious after all.

0

"Hoss an ass'ole, Mer', dunno how ya coulda stand his _kind_."

Merle grunted and kicked the sheets off his body. It was too hot to sleep and Daryl was stuck against his back with his arms wrapped around his chest. "He always had a steady flow 'f drugs. Was 'nough for me," he huffed.

Daryl hummed against the back of his neck, blazing lips grazing against his skin. "Bet he's not even a good lay," he muttered.

                                                                                          

Merle tensed and turned around, grunting as the change of position sent one of Daryl's knee into his flank. "Ya one of them queers now, lil' bro?"

Daryl stared and grabbed a pack of smoke from the bedside table and lit one calmly, zippo loud in the night, illuminating his angular face eerily. He inhaled deeply, the cherry-red tip glowing bright against the hollow of his cheeks and Merle watched mesmerized, wondering if Daryl's dark beauty wasn't one more trick of the devil.

"M'not queer, Mer', just sayin'." He shrugged and folded an arm behind his head, blue eyes fixed on the water-stained ceiling.

"Ya fucked boys, Daryl?"

Daryl smirked around his cigarette dangling dangerously at the corner of his mouth. "Yeah," he breathed out with a cloud of smoke.

Merle hissed between his teeth and let his head fall down against his arm in exasperation. "What's wrong with girls?" he muttered and rubbed the side of his face, feeling the stubble where he hadn't shaved for more than a week.

Daryl threw his cigarette on the floor and curled back up on the side around Merle. "Boys're more durable. They don't break so easily," he whispered in the quiet of the bedroom. "And they don't go cryin' and complainin' 'bout me fuckin' them raw 'cause they're soooooo ashamed 'f what they did."

Merle grunted and shook his head, lifting a hand to gently pat Daryl's cheek. "Well, any case, don't go fuckin' Jake. Dunno what disease he might have."

Daryl hummed sleepily. "Don't need to," he slurred. "He's gonna screw himself up alone."

Merle leaned up, pressing his lips chastely against his little brother's. "Night, baby."

Merle had no doubt they'd leave Atlanta with a dead junkie behind them, but the question was, how messy was it going to be?

0

The bike show had been a blast.

Daryl loved it, and Merle was proud to have been part of his brother's happiness.

As they went to the apartment, that feeling dampened a bit.

He sighed heavily and rubbed his face, eyes on Jake's body lying between the armchair and the coffee table. The man was covered in vomit, white foam crusting at the corner of his mouth, and Merle didn't know if he should feel relieved or not. 

An overdose for a known drug addict was rather inconspicuous. 

Daryl was sitting next to Merle, scruffy military boots on the coffee table, knees bent as he blew smoke rings calmly. "'S'up, Mer'?" he rasped in perplexity with an undertone of amusement. "I ain't even touched 'im." 

Merle leaned back and stole Daryl's cigarette right out of his mouth. He was silent as he took a deep drag with his eyes still fixed on Jake's corpse. 

"Daryl?" 

"Mhm?"

"What d'ya feel, Daryl?" he asked huskily after a long contemplative silence. 

Daryl chuckled and leaned into Merle's side. "Ya tryna shrink me now?" 

Merle put an arm on the back of the couch, letting his fingers gently play with the longish hair at Daryl's nape. "Stopped tryin' when ya was still a baby," he finally said. 

Daryl started drumming his fingers against Merle's thigh. "T's quiet now."

Merle nodded slowly. "D'ya do that ta make them quiet or 'cause ya feel good 'bout it?" 

Daryl turned his head and stared at Merle's chin. "Ain't it the same?"

0

Daryl wasn't the jealous type. It was worse because he _was_ the possessive type. While he let Merle have his fun with girls, the boy never hid the fact he couldn't stand having them gravitating around him.

Drowning his third shot of whisky, Merle still kept an eye on his brother at the corner of his eyes, even if the pretty brunette—pretty, but totally drunk—was continuing to rub against him.

Daryl was sitting in a booth at the back of the bar. He was spread-legged and holding a shot of something brown, but Merle knew it wasn't whisky. He was staring at him and the girl, smoke dangling at his mouth and totally ignoring the two girls trying to get his attention on both sides.

He was letting them touch him and Merle knew he was in _that_ kind of mood.

Not precisely the same as the dead girl from the garage, but not far from it. It was a mood Merle hated more than the others.

He turned back to look at the girl and listened to her drunken ramble, nearly wanting to ditch her and get Daryl out before he did something. It was too close to Atlanta even if Jake dying had no way of ever being linked to Daryl.

He turned around and narrowed his eyes when he saw the mass of bodies grinding against each other desperately, Daryl at the center, two girls on each arm. He looked drunk. And was kissing and touching them, overtly decadent. He was wearing his leather jacket; his shirt was open, and one of the girls was feeling up and down is chest and abs, scratching her nails on his skin.

                                                                                         

Merle gritted his teeth at the sight, because it may be twisted and _wrongwrongwrong_ , but he couldn't stand those whores touching his baby brother like that.

And Daryl knew it.

0

Since he was a small boy, Daryl's favorite mantra had been ' _I ain't afraid of nothin'_.'

Merle knew it wasn't true.

Daryl had fears.

Merle sat on the bathtub as he watched Daryl shave with a bowie knife. It was something Merle never mastered, but razors worked just as good, so he didn't see the need to use a knife.

There was an ant creeping up the sink, and Daryl crushed it with his index finger as he wiped the knife of shaving cream on the towel wrapped around his waist.

Merle stared at the scars on his brother's back, the demons tattooed on his skin, the wide shoulders and trim waist.

They definitely didn't look the same. The both of them. They looked so different some days Merle felt his gut twist.

But he didn't care.

Daryl was still his baby brother, who was his son. It was fact.

It was life.

0

Daryl bled like everybody else.

It surprised Merle the first time. He hadn't expected red blood to ooze from his little brother's body, but maybe some kind of black sludge.

Daryl only grunted when Merle pressed the rag against his side to stop the bleeding.

The flowing stab wound was proof Daryl had red blood in his veins, and Merle's fingers tingled at the feeling, because it was like diving his hands in boiling dishwater. "You're aw'right, baby bro," he muttered and nearly snarled when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

It was a man in a paramedic uniform and Merle wanted to bash the head of the moron who called 911, but he nodded at him and lifted his hands to leave the man and woman work on his brother.

"What happened?" the woman asked. She was a tall brunette with hard completion, but Merle guessed working such a difficult job and mostly with men, had to harden any weak character.

"Drunk hoss stabbed ma brother," he only answered, accent made thick with worry and rage.

The woman pinched her lips in annoyance and sneered once as she looked around before tearing open a pad of compress. The owner of the bar had yelled at anyone to get out of dodge after the police had dragged the asshole away. Merle crossed his arms in front of him and chewed on the skin around his thumb as they worked on Daryl.

The boy wasn't moving, just staring at the ceiling and grunting every few seconds, either in discomfort or aggravation Merle couldn't tell. Daryl had an impossible high tolerance to pain, so he gathered Daryl was more annoyed at being prodded and poked than feeling pain in his wound.

"Excuse me, sir."

Merle's eyebrow twitched and he turned around to stare at the man in uniform— _totally wrong kind of uniform this time_. "What is it, Officer?" he asked absently as he turned back to watch with an eagle eye how they were now inserting an IV line into Daryl's hand.

"I'm Officer Grimes, and this is Officer Walsh. We'd like to know what happened."  

Merle snorted. "My brother got stabbed. Think 't's pretty o'vious," he muttered and gestured to the bloody wads littering the floor around Daryl.

The man took a step closer and lowered his head, trying to catch Merle's eyes. "I need more than that," he informed in an infuriating calm voice.

Merle bristled but tried to shrug his frustration. "That guy's a regular 'ere. He's known for being a jerk and he never lik'd ma brother."

Grimes nodded slowly and put his hands on his hips. "Why? Why doesn't he like your brother?"

Merle wanted to punch the guy and wipe that condescending look from his face, but he refrained. It wouldn't do Daryl any good if he was locked up and his brother was all alone in the hospital. "'Cause Daryl's smart 'n the ladies like a pretty face and a good brain." Merle shrugged. "Hell, man, that guy is a mean sun'ov'a bitch, didn't need a reason ta attack ma brother. Last month dude got arrested for beatin' his girlfriend 'cause she didn' buy the right brand o' beer…"

Grimes nodded slowly and turned his eyes on Daryl, and Merle felt the man's next words before they left his mouth. "I'm sure your brother will be all right."

Merle snorted and turned to stare at the man at the same time the paramedic loaded Daryl on the stretcher. "'Course he'll be aw'right," he sneered and followed the medics and his brother to the ambulance.

Stupid no good for nothing pigs the whole of them.

Two months after stabbing Daryl in the bar, Marvin Berry was killed in prison.

It was said the man had gone crazy and started screaming and crying day in and day out, begging forgiveness and swearing to God he could hear the _Devil_ speak to him, promising a slow agonizing death.

Berry was found dead in his cell—chocked on his own blood with his tongue ripped out and eyes clawed out of their sockets.

Daryl stared at the side of Merle's face the whole time Mike from the garage told him. He was still staring when Lou, Mike, and Walt started speculating about what happened, Merle joining halfheartedly.

Because, yes, he was wondering what happened too.

He rubbed his fingers together, phantom feeling of Daryl's blood on his hands and blinked and blinked and blinked.

Blood meant _life_ —so why did it felt like everything was pointing to _death_ around them?

0

Merle never actively hurt Daryl. A slap to the back of the head, a nudge in the ribs, some brotherly wrestling. But he never _hurt_ him physically.

Emotionally was different. 

One day Daryl bought a dog home. From the lanky and dirty hair and visible ribs, Merle knew the poor thing had been fending for itself for a long time alone in the woods. He didn't give it a long time to live, because Daryl usually enjoyed killing things for fun and this one wouldn't be his first dog. But this one seemed different. 

Daryl bathed it, talked to it, rubbed it behind his ears and treated it like a damn pet. The beast was a wolf-dog, and, after a few weeks of caring and some good meat, the dog just got massive, was probably more wolf than dog and was as bad tempered as Daryl on his best days.

"I swear ta God, Daryl, 'f you don't get rid o' the mutt, I'll wring its neck! It fuckin' _bit me_!" he hissed angrily as he examined his bleeding hand. Damn thing nearly ripped his hand off when he accidently nudged it a bit too harshly.

Daryl narrowed his eyes at him and sat heavily on the kitchen chair facing him, dropping the first aid kit loudly on the table. His little brother examined the wound, turning his hand and fingers this way and that before starting to clean it and stitch the deeper gouges. "'f course he bit ya, Mer'," he murmured after a moment, nimble (burning) fingers unflinching in their task. " _He_ 's jus' scared."

Merle narrowed his eyes at his brother's bent head and gritted his teeth, because, _of course_ , after spending years in denial and finally deciding to man up and get a damn library card, Merle got some answers about his little brother's _problem_ . He huffed and kicked Daryl's shin. " _He_ 's strong. He can survive alone."

Daryl sucked on his lower lip as he nipped a longer piece of thread with a pair of scissors. "Maybe he's just tired," he shrugged. "Maybe he jus' need a home, 'n som'one ta take care o' 'im and let 'im know t's aw'right."

Merle heaved a great sigh and stared at the ceiling in exasperation. "Who did I fuckin' piss off ta get a brother like you, uh?" he mumbled theatrically, placing the back of his uninjured hand on his forehead, the room falling silent for long moment. "Damn mutt can stay, I guess," he finally mumbled, rubbing his hand over his eyes. "'Course it's gonna be aw'right…"

He looked down and met Daryl's eyes. They still looked cold as ice but it was only the color. For nearly the first time, Merle saw something else in there.

Warmth.

Maybe with time he could also teach Daryl to see colors, because, as much as he sometimes just wanted to _hurt_ Daryl, he knew he couldn't help but love him even more.      

0

A gentle hand patting his cheek roused him from his slumber. The plastic chair was uncomfortable and the squirrels he let on the fire were burnt to a crisp, but he didn't care. He watched as Daryl sat on the chair opposite to his own and accepted the can of canned peaches.

Every summer, they built a fire pit in front of the house because they both couldn't stand being inside. And anyway, it was too hot in the house.  

He chuckled at Daryl's forwarding about the peaches and ripped the lid, digging his fingers inside the can.

Canned peaches had somewhat become a tradition to their little Dixon family. They both ate too much of the thing to really enjoy it anymore, but the cupboards were still stocked full of it all year long. Wouldn't give it up for anything.

Daryl yawned next to him and rubbed his face tiredly, racking his fingers through his hairs, and the angle was just right, just enough for Merle to see the silver scars hidden under Daryl's mop of hair at his temples. And just like that, his guts congealed with bitter bile. And guilt and hatred and fear and blame and loathing.

And memories.

0

Nine years ago, he nearly let his fourteen year old little brother drown in the river they used to play as kids.

He was coming back from work, and Daryl was supposed to be back from school. The stilted ghost of little Debbie Thomas in the back of his mind was enough for Merle to decide to track down the boy. And he nearly regretted it.

Daryl was in the river, waist-deep and holding the head of another boy under the water. For a second, Merle was struck down by such paralyzing fear, he couldn't move. But then, the other boy reacted and managed to punch Daryl and reverse their position, holding his little brother's head underwater.

And still, Merle didn't move.

Fucking stayed where he was. Waiting.

It's only when Daryl stopped his struggle and went limp that his suspended animation broke and motion came back to his frozen body. He rushed to the water, pushed the bumbling boy aside and carried Daryl's unconscious body to the shore. His heart was beating, but he wasn't breathing, and Merle didn't wait to start mouth-to-mouth.

It took longer than it should have, and the only noise in the forest was Merle breathing for his ( _ohgodpleaseno_ )not-breathing little brother and the other kid sobbing and pleading.

It was so long, so terrifying, Merle was sure he waited too long.

But then Daryl started to cough and spit out dirty water and curl up on himself, and cry.

Crying, because despite everything, Merle had nearly let him die in a weak moment of hesitation.

He cradled Daryl in his arms and rocked him lovingly, shushing him and patting his head and back, whispering soothing nothings in his ear, trying to crush the guilt and panic.

But Daryl just sobbed and sobbed and sobbed, because _he just knew_. And Merle will go to his grave knowing Daryl had known he'd waited.      

And after that, Merle was unable to convince the other kid to shut up like he did with Debbie Thomas. 

That was when things started to go to shit.

The parents completely flipped out and called the police, even when Merle explained _he_ was the one who had to perform CPR on his brother, but no one would listen. 

The facts were simple, really.

Daryl Dixon was a troubled kid with a shoddy background and vague childhood. He was moody, temperamental, violent, and unpredictable.

Counselors and teachers happily testified when the police interrogated them. Then, people around started to speak about how they always knew something was wrong with the younger Dixon boy. 

After that, CPS threatened to take Daryl away from Merle if he didn't agree to place Daryl in a mental institution for a while.

And just like that, they took Merle's baby brother away, made him sign forms of _consent_ for therapy and forbade him to see Daryl. Then, when conventional treatment wasn't working, they started talking about something more aggressive. Something that _could_ work.

_'And really Mr. Dixon, this is in Daryl's best interest...if you don't want to lose guardianship….'_

So he signed. 

Signed for ECT. Electric convulsive therapy. Also known as electric shock therapy.

He agreed for them to strap his little brother down to a table and flip him over so he wouldn't choke on his own vomit. They'd inject him a muscle relaxant, then they'd tape electrodes to his forehead, and after all that, they'd turn up the juice. And when his toes started to twitch: that would mean he was having a major convulsion…which was what they wanted.

That was what they called _healing_. By passing huge amounts of electric current through his brain.  

They told him it was the most effective treatment and forced on him pages of statistic and pamphlets, seemingly trying to convince themselves as much as him and just mentioning in passing the _small_ side effects.

When they finally allowed Merle to see Daryl—three months after he was locked in—he knew he had to do everything in his power to get Daryl out of here. 

The visiting hours were strict and the visiting room was concrete gray. Merle didn't see troubled kids heal in this environment and nearly wanted to throw up knowing he'd let them put Daryl in there. Because prison for Merle had been better than that. 

A teenager two tables down was rocking back and forth, her mother crying, her father looking sick as the girl just stared at nothing, drool dribbling down her chin and onto her blue standard-issue pajamas. 

Merle looked away and rubbed his face, praying (for the first time in forever) his little brother hadn't become some kind of useless dribbling vegetable. He waited and waited and waited, and finally two burly orderlies led his brother to him and Merle stood shakily because—

_Dear god what have I done?_

—that scrawny, emaciated, ill-looking, tiny boy wasn't his brother. His face was only bones with black rings under his faded, empty eyes. His hair was in disarray with some missing tuffs in some spots, and there were angry red burns on his temples.

Where they placed the electrodes. 

Merle stepped shakily toward Daryl, but the two men shook their heads, forbidding him to touch when all he wanted was to hug his brother. He gritted his teeth, thought of disobeying protocol but finally sat heavily at the bolted metal table and watched them push Daryl in the opposite stool. 

"Hey," Merle whispered croakily after clearing his throat several times. "Hey, lil' D." The nickname was as much for Merle's comfort as his little brother.

He didn't know what to say. _'How are you?' 'Are they treating you well?'_ Sure, Merle, right between knocking him out with drugs and frying his brain. "Hey, lil' bro," he repeated brokenly and pressed the heels of his hands in his eyes. 

Daryl stayed mute and sad—oh _God_ , so, so sad—observing him, and Merle just didn't know what to do. "They tol' me ya was makin' good progress," he rasped, trying to catch Daryl's elusive gaze. "'N that I'll be able ta take ya home soon." 

Daryl blinked and tilted his head on the side, looking at him sideways, his eyes somewhere around Merle's mouth. Maybe _looking_ for the lie. 

He could barely look at him, and it was so painful that Merle felt it physically. Daryl's eyes were accusing, but they didn't need to be. They were screaming at him, and Merle had long since learnt to read his silent brother.

_Why did you save me if you were just gonna leave me? Are you punishing me? Are you better off without me?_

He gritted his teeth and tighten his fists until his knuckles became bloodless white. "Soon baby, yeah?" he whispered, always trying to catch his eyes. 

Daryl brought his thumb to his mouth and started to chew on it, his other arm wrapping around his belly protectively as he started to rock back and forth. The other fingers near his mouth were scratching his cheek and Merle itched to just wrap him in his arms and bundle him home.

He couldn't stand it.

Couldn't stand seeing his baby brother so vulnerable and small and lost and hurt—all that because of him.

Because he'd been unable to protect him. 

He looked over Daryl's shoulder and narrowed his eyes slightly at the ever-present orderlies. They were close enough to monitor Daryl and Merle if he tried to touch him, but they were too far to hear what they were saying.

He took a deep breath and shifted his gaze on his little brother. "Ya need ta tell 'em what they want to hear," he whispered and tapped his knuckles slightly on the table to draw Daryl's attention on them. "Ya need to tell 'em ya know 't'was wrong 'n that you'll never do it 'gain. 'N that you're _sorry_." He stared intently at Daryl. "D'you und'rstand, Daryl?" he asked more urgently.

It was long before Daryl blinked his understanding without breaking his rocking and chewing on his thumb.

Leaving Daryl behind that day had probably been one of the most difficult things in his life. 

0

He blinked out of his thought when Daryl patted his cheek again, and just like that he found himself in present day, sitting around the fire pit in front of their house eating canned peaches.

He smiled uneasily but lovingly at his brother and rubbed his eyes.

ECT had fried Daryl's memories. Huge chunks of his childhood were gone after the treatment. It had been painful and dehumanizing torture, and they'd never really known how much damage they did to him.

But one thing was for sure: electroshock therapy had never cured Daryl from his psychotic tendencies and urges.

It didn't erase his memories of their father beating him up either. 

It only served to make him better at hiding them.

0

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you everyone for reading this work. I know it's strange, violent and very dark, but I had it in my head for a very long time and just had to write it.


	3. After the night when I wake up

0

The day after they celebrated Daryl's twenty-fifth birthday, Merle took off.

Packed his shit and just left on his bike.

He drove two hours straight before turning around and going back home. When he parked the bike, Daryl was sitting on the porch, patiently waiting for him as if he'd known all along Merle was going to come back.

What Merle didn't anticipate though, was the clear devastation and pure unadulterated sadness in his baby brother's eyes. Daryl looked at him right in the eyes like he did so randomly and just…stared, with his so familiar blue eyes full of tears Merle wasn't sure he'd ever let fall.

In that second Merle knew he'd once more let down his little brother. It seemed the only thing he did regularly in his life. Leave him behind, abandon him and never look back. Something broke that day and Daryl stood and went back into the house closing the door behind him quietly. Accusing, forgiving.

Merle stumbled on the porch and crashed down on the steps, putting his head in his hands.

And he wept.

Three days later, Daryl totally broke down and went into a week-long killing spree. Merle couldn’t fault him, it was his fault after all. He'd pushed Daryl to the edge. The kid had a pretty strong hold on his mind most of the times, and Merle often saw him fight tooth and nail against the _thing_ in his head, but that day he wasn't strong enough anymore. He took his crossbow, his knife and left in the middle of the night.

Merle found him a week later in some parts of the Appalachians they'd never been, the remnants of six bodies around him. He was covered head to toe in blood and was sawing off the arm of one of his victim.

                                                                                          

The men he'd killed were two times bigger than Daryl—those typical bearded rednecks dealing with moonshine and meth in old mining caves. They wouldn't really be missed and the localization of their cabin was pretty far into the woods and it looked like their business had been going on for a long time, so problems with the police finding the place were slim.            

Merle was too used to guts and blood by now to be sick, but it didn't mean he wasn't disgusted by the methodical way Daryl was dismembering those men. He patted his pockets and shakily lit a cigarette, sitting heavily on the bed of the pick-up, his legs dangling uselessly in front of him, trying to block out the sound of bones crushing and tendons ripping.

A moan made him jump out of his skin and he looked up startlingly to see Daryl slowly walk to one of the men. Not quite dead yet.

It took Merle three days to drive here. Merle gathered in the week he'd been gone, Daryl arrived in this place four days ago…and _played_ with those men like he rarely had the occasion. His killings were generally a matter of hours…never days.

He didn't mean to feel sympathetic (couldn't afford it, really) but those men had to suffer a kind of agony he didn't want to even imagine. He knew his little brother too well—and his mad skills with knives—to know he could really hurt someone without killing them too quickly.

He watched Daryl drag the man still alive by the ankle and Merle felt a morbid fascination take hold of him at the sight of him. Entire patches of his skin were missing in some places, his eyes were two empty vacant holes—where the hell were his eyes?—and one leg was missing above the knee; he had no remaining nails and, by the way his mouth was streaming blood and he was moaning, his tongue had been cut.

Daryl stopped dragging him next to the holes he'd been digging and had thrown the other bodies, before sitting on the dying man's stomach. Merle knew he'd never be able to erase the sound coming out of such a ruined human body. Daryl leaned over the man's head and gripped his skull forcedly with his hands whispering things in his ears, digging his thumbs into the man's empty eye socket.

Daryl reached into his blood soaked jeans and took something, pressing it against the man's lips until he had no choice but to open his mouth. Merle stood suddenly and walked around to the front of the car, leaning over the hood on shaky arms and taking deep breath against the intense nauseating sickness.

Because Daryl was forcing the man to swallow his own eyes.

He threw up again and again until he was only gagging on bile and then dry heaving. He tried to slow down his shaking body, to slow down his breathing and his fucking heart because even if it was _breakingbreakingbreaking_ it was also beating way too hard in his chest.

He wanted to scream, to crawl out of his skin and just forget what he'd seen. He wanted to dig his own eyes out of his skull and burn them like Daryl was burning everything around him. He wanted to leave and stay gone. He wanted to hug his baby brother and rock him in his arms. He wanted to be brave for once and stop all this madness. He wanted to go back and choke his newborn baby brother, he wanted to leave him drown, he wanted to not be able to make him breathe again, he wanted to leave him in the psychic ward and let them fry his brain until he was nothing but an inanimate, drooling corpse. He wanted to kiss his brother and tell him everything was going to be alright. 

He didn't look up when he heard the nearly silent shuffle of Daryl's boots on the forest floor and didn't react when the blood stained shoes came in view. He prayed for something, anything, but he wasn't stupid enough to believe there was a cure to his little brother's insanity.

There wasn't an exorcism like their mother tried, there wasn't anything to beat out of him like their father tried. No, there was just something medically wrong in Daryl's head making him do all those things. No evil, no devil's spawn…just some wrong connections. An illness so twisted and dark it made Daryl (—sweet, beautiful, kind little Daryl—) do all those atrocious things.

A knife came in his line of sight, hilt in his direction and Daryl's bloody hand around the blade. He knew what it meant, he knew what Daryl was asking him—offering him. _'Go on, Mer', 's what ya want, innit? What ya want'd since I was born?'_

Merle sobbed and shook his head. "Don't do that ta me, baby," he begged brokenly. "Please don't do that."

Daryl let the knife fall on the ground, hand limply falling down against his body, like a puppet losing its string and he crumbled on the ground. "I dunno how ta stop it, Mer'," he moaned—as if in pain—in so much pain. "I ain't ever wanted ta be like that." He was rocking on himself, like he always did when in too much stress, tugging at his hair painfully, ripping out handful. "I'm sorry!"

Merle would have thrown up again if he'd had anything left in his stomach. He'd caused this. He was the reason Daryl was apologizing to him for being fucking born in the first place. Merle led them right here. He'd never done anything to stop Daryl. He could have, probably _should_ have, but he would never be able to forgive himself if he just threw Daryl away because things started to become a bit too hard to deal with.

He sat heavily on the ground and dragged Daryl on his laps, his back against Merle's chest, and wrapped his arms around his thin waist. He pressed a kiss to Daryl's neck, over a round scar left behind by a cigarette burn, and buried his face in the hair covering his brother's neck. "I don't want ya ta ever be sorry for bein' born, Daryl," he whispered fiercely after a long moment. Daryl was trembling in his arms, still rocking despite being wrapped protectively by Merle's bigger body. "You in my life, t'was the greatest thing that ever happened to me. I lost sight of it, I know. And _I'm_ sorry for that. We need ta talk 'bout what's happenin' ta us 'n try ta figure it out. It'll be aw'right, I can promise ya that."  

Daryl turned his head and tucked his face in Merle's neck, pressing a small feather like kiss under Merle's chin. "I love you."

Maybe Merle forgot that part somewhere down the road between the blood and insanity. Because in the end, wasn't that the most important part? Not the thing in Daryl's head, not the accumulating body count, not the guilt…but just the love? "I love you too, baby brother."

That was life. That was fact.

0

When he slept, Daryl looked normal. Innocent.

It was hard to imagine the rage and insanity behind his soft features.

He looked younger too, but it was hard to guess his age for someone who wasn't Merle. The guys at the garage had a running bet about Daryl's age. They often gave him a good five years above his real age.

He looked older than he was. His face—when awake—was cold and empty. His eyes were narrowed, which gave him an everlasting untrusting gaze. His ears were protruding. One of his eyes was droopier than the other—a result of one of their father's raging fist that broke his eye socket and got mended by passable but not ideal repair surgery by a doctor who didn't ask much questions back then.

He had a pretty deep scar on his forehead too, caused by a hunting accident when he was twelve. Poor kid got the butt of Merle's rifle in the face when it should have been in the face of a former friend of Merle's. Guy had it coming, but his little brother got hurt in the crossfire.

Didn't cry, just looked stunned for a moment before glaring dagger at the asshole Merle was targeting. The man started to laugh at Daryl, mocking him and calling him names and before Daryl had even been able to do anything, Merle had knocked _him_ out—for real this time—and left him unconscious in the middle of the forest, taking his brother back home to stitch him up. They never saw the guy again after that incident.

Merle looked down when he felt Daryl shift on his chest and blew smoke at the ceiling of his bedroom. A good painting wouldn't hurt the walls, but he didn't care. What he cared about was knowing how to contain Daryl's rage. He couldn't afford to let something like the bender he'd fallen into after Merle left him. 

He knew he was a shit brother for doing what he did, but they'd talk for hours on the subject afterward, and Daryl understood that sometimes it all got to be too much for him.

So, Daryl had accepted that, sometimes, Merle would have to leave for a few days and Merle had promised to leave him a note or tell him. Not leave like a thief and give his brother the impression he was abandoning him.            

Merle crushed his cigarette in the ashtray on the bedside table and slowly slipped down the headboard to lean against his pillows, trying not to jostle his brother.

It was hard to determine his brother's sleeping pattern. Sometimes, Daryl slept like the dead for hours on end and sometimes he didn't sleep for two or three days.

Tonight seemed to be one of those where a gunshot fired next to the bed wouldn't wake him. Merle snorted at that and slowly ran his hand up and down Daryl's bare back. He heard the quiet sound of claw on the wooden floor and looked on the side to see Daryl's pet stare at him in the moonlight.

Merle scoffed and watched the dog stretch before slumping down boneless in front of the open door, blocking the passage. He still didn't truly appreciate having the mutt in his house, but he guessed he could tolerate him for Daryl's sake. The kid had attached himself to the dog and had made him a pretty decent hunting hound too, so Merle couldn't really complain.

The dog spent last winter in the house and followed Daryl around like a damn puppy, taking to groan at Merle like a sport, but as soon as the weather was more clement, he would disappear into the forest and not return for days.

Daryl didn't seem too worried about the dog's disappearance, so Merle guessed it was okay. Not that he _liked_ the dog, but he didn't want it to die for his little brother's sake. He read somewhere having a pet was good therapy, so maybe this dog wouldn't end up like most of the ones Daryl met along his life.

Maybe Daryl even saw a kindred spirit in the dog, as it was half wolf and a killer.

Of course, as the little shit that he was, Daryl called his dog _Bundy_. He had laughed his ass off for days when Merle refused to use it, whereas the mutt took to his new name in a matter of hours.

It fitted. Of course it fitted. But sometimes Daryl didn't seem to realize what made him laugh so hard was actually pretty sick for someone—well, someone _normal_ like Merle.

He'd used his famous library card within the week of the dog receiving its name and went on the internet to gather intel. Because, while Merle heard of the guy—who hadn't?—he'd never stopped and thought of Ted Bundy in details.

What he read froze him, then disgusted him, then made him chuckle. _Just a little bit_.

Because he didn't want the old lady keeping an eye on her books like a harpy thinking he was some sort of sick redneck trash looking for _ideas_ . She had eyed him from head to toe for _endless_ minutes when he'd first subscribed to get a library card, and he didn't want to have her think she should maybe forbid him from coming and call the cops.

Since getting his card, his readings were mostly on psychology and psychiatry. He'd also taken to stalk around criminal and law textbooks…so, yes, his behavior was highly suspicious, especially when he never bothered dressing in anything else than old ripped jeans and leather.

But he reckoned people couldn't get arrested for reading on serial killers, right?

And he liked the library. Even took Daryl sometimes. The kid loved reading and would often immerse himself in classic literature while Merle tried to put together the pieces of Daryl's brain. And they always had a good laugh—at Merle's expense of course—when he talked about going to the library.

So, that day, he went after work and read on Ted Bundy and hoped his little brother wasn't prone to necrophilia.

That'd be— _yeah_ …that'd be a bit too much. Even for Merle.

0

Merle was closing the hood of the green little car of old Mr. Paxton when he heard Daryl call for him. He turned with a raised eyebrow and tilted his chin in his brother's direction as he walked to him, leaning his back against the hood of the car Daryl was perched on.

"Merle, what's the color of the sky?" Daryl asked and put his chin on Merle's shoulder.

He snorted and patted his pockets for his pack of cigarette and lighter. "Blue, lil' D. Did ya forget or somthin'?" he asked and felt Daryl's legs wrap around his waist and his scorching body drape over his back.

Like a comfortable duvet. Safe, familiar. Loving.

Daryl's right arm was dangling over his right shoulder and his left was playing absently with the buckle of Merle's belt.

Merle knew perfectly how it looked from outside. This proximity. This ambiguous touching a bit too intimate for two brothers to be really healthy, especially when Daryl had been underage. But they didn't care, and more than that, they both craved the contact and touching. 

"Uh…I guess," Daryl muttered in Merle's neck. "Blue ya say? Like our eyes?"

Merle chuckled and lit two cigarettes. "Yeah baby, like our eyes." He reached behind him deliberately slowly to give Daryl his cigarette when the kid started squirming impatiently. Like a damn toddler.

They both looked up at the same time when a commotion erupted near the office and a man slammed the door behind him bellowing and clearly drunk. "I just have 'nough of ya, Carol," he slurred.

Merle lifted an eyebrow and stared. Carol took care of paperwork and clients. When their business had started to flourish and become famous, Merle had nearly keeled over at the mountain of paperwork that had to be done to get a garage going. Daryl took care of accounting, but Carol dealt with people when the brothers couldn't care less about them. And Mike, Lou, and Walt were too rude to appeal to customers as they were happier talking to engines rather than old ladies or overworked business men.

Buncha weirdos, the lot of them.

"Oh, so this is Ed," Daryl hummed next to Merle's ears, pointy chin digging in his shoulder.

Merle nodded in realization and watched Carol cross her arms on her chest over her blue plaid shirt, looking annoyed and put out. The man was a sleaze. He couldn't keep a job for more than a month and seemed perpetually drunk.

Merle knew that if it wasn't for her kid daughter and the house in Ed's name, Carol would get the fuck out of this town.

He felt Daryl thrum with excitement and reached behind him to poke his brother's forehead with his fingers to calm him. Daryl huffed but gradually stopped twitching so much.

"Do ya think he's gonna hit her?" Daryl asked a bit too eagerly when the two continued screaming at each other.

Merle shrugged. "Uh, hope not, we'll have ta interfere 'therwise." Well, when Merle thought about it, Daryl probably counted on Ed hitting Carol so he _could_ interfere.

But like in some bad B movie, a car pulled up in front of the garage and Merle groaned audibly. "Oh shit," he hissed under his breath.

Those assholes cops exited the cruiser and walked to the screaming couple with their hands on their belt like some wannabe cowboys. Especially the one with the stupid hat.

"Oh, lookit," Daryl cooed. "Our piggy friends."  

Merle grimaced and tisked his tongue. He knew his day was going to be bad when he didn't have his first cup of coffee this morning because the coffee maker took a bad hit when Merle slammed it on the floor…accidently.

The taller and broader cop stayed with the couple, trying to calm Carol and her husband, whereas the other one— _Grimes_ , Merle remembered—walked to them, his face pinched.  

"Mr. Dixon," he nodded in his direction and lifted an eyebrow at Daryl's uncommon position, still wrapped around him like a monkey. "And Mr. Dixon." He tilted his hat slightly and sniffed. "Mrs. Palmer from the hair salon 'cross the road called us because she heard screaming…"

Merle stared mutely, taking a leaf in Daryl's book, and Grimes sighed, nearly rolling his eyes. "Care to tell me why you didn't intervene?"

Merle shifted his jaw slightly and took a deep drag on his cigarette. "They jus' talkin', Officer, ain't no need ta get involved when t's'not my business."

Grimes blinked and put his hands on his hips, looking above his shoulder at Daryl quickly before turning back to Merle. "It appears the husband is drunk," he stated. "You didn't feel the need to help your female employee facing a potentially violent male?" 

Merle scoffed and sneered at the man. "Ya sayin' my _weak_ female employee can't take care 'f herself so I have ta _help_ her, that what ya say, Officer?"

Grimes pinched his lips but before he could answer voices started to rise behind and they turned to watch Carol slam her knee between Ed's legs making the man yell in tormented pain and fall down the ground heavily. Grimes turned back to them in slight bewilderment and Merle smirked. "Carol's a feisty one," he explained blandly, "she's the one ya have to watch out for." He put his hand in his pocket. "Ya gunna arrest her?"

Grimes gritted his teeth in irritation whistled at Walsh to get his attention. "Let's get out of here," he said.

Walsh looked ready to protest, glaring at the Dixons with dark eyes as if looking for a reason to arrest them but followed his partner to the car, slamming his door in anger. They watched the police car reverse and disappear down the road before turning back to the couple still arguing, albeit more sedately.

"Yo, Carol," Merle called and the woman kicked her husband's leg before walking to them, her head down contritely.

"I'm sorry, Merle," she started, rubbing his hands on her jeans. "I didn't know he was going to come here and stir trouble."

Daryl slid down from the hood and Merle watched him walk to Ed, kneeling next to the fallen man still twisting on the ground and holding his hands between his legs. If Daryl had a stick, Merle was sure he'd poke him like some interesting road kill.    

He turned back to Carol and nodded at her. "Last time," he grunted. "Don't need no pigs comin' sniffin' 'round here."

She smiled at him, going on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek. "I promise, boss," she chuckled and walked to her loser husband, gently ruffling Daryl's hair in passing.

Carol had a way with his brother that he was still trying to figure out.

Daryl liked her. Tolerated her more than anyone who wasn't Merle and more or less talked to her. Didn't even twitch when she called him _Pookie_. She never hesitated to touch him, playful nudges, motherly gestures, or annoyed slaps when Daryl said something—rare as it was—that didn't sit well with her, generally something derogatory or so dry no one could see the humor except him.

Merle reckoned it was because she never seemed scared of Daryl.

Women generally turned around Daryl because of his dark aura. They wanted to sample something _bad_ , something forbidden and never left unscratched from an encounter with him. When he was just in a mood to fuck he wasn't gentle or gallant, and since Merle had to finally admit and stop his lifelong denial about his little brother, he'd learnt Daryl hadn't been a virgin since a very long time.

So, when Daryl understood Merle had stopped burying his head in the sand, girls had started to appear in their house after long nights in bars. Sometimes, Daryl even fucked them right after Merle. Sometimes, he fucked them in the living room and didn't bother with false modesty in front of him.

Sometimes, he even sat himself in an armchair and watched Merle do his own girls, just smoking and smirking. First times had been like a damned cold shower and froze Merle's right down the spot, but after a while he'd gotten used to it and even found some kind of perverted enjoyment in the whole affair. Having his baby brother watch him fuck a girl had never been on his list of kinks, but well…he was a flexible kind of guy.

So, Carol.

Merle never tried to get her in his bed. He wasn't stupid enough to mix business and sex and also because he liked her. And he was pretty sure Daryl wouldn't get between her legs even with a ten foot pole.

Carol seemed like the kind of girl still waiting for her prince charming, a man who would take her away from her bastard husband and give her the house of her dream with a white picket fences.

She could wait a very long time if that was what she wanted from the Dixon brothers. But her easy going nature and fearlessness seemed to tug something in Daryl's cold blood heart, so Merle couldn't complain.

He wondered if it was her smile, or her gentle blue eyes. She wasn't pretty, wasn't ugly either, but Merle knew Daryl never stopped at a girl's face. Maybe it was her voice, sweet and calm. Maybe it was her strength after coming to the garage covered in bruises and threatening her husband to have him arrested if he so much as touched her again.

Maybe Merle would never know why his brother didn't see a potential victim in Carol.

Not matter, she was useful around the garage and cooked for them.

0

The burger joint wasn't full but it was more crowded than Merle was comfortable with. He sat in the usual booth in the back while Daryl stayed behind and leaned over the counter to chat up Misty, the chief's daughter. 

She usually worked all her summer here to save up for college. Last time Merle talked to her, she was studying literature to become a teacher. Earl—her father—hadn't been really happy to see his only child go to Atlanta and leave him and the restaurant. 

Daryl came back after a moment with two mugs of coffee filled to the brim. "Misty's got a boyfriend," he sing-songed as he sat opposite Merle with his bum on a folded leg and a cigarette perched behind his ear. 

Merle lifted an eyebrow and sipped his drink. He would have preferred a beer but it was only seven in the morning. "Aw, ya heartbroken, Princess?" 

The kid snorted and pursed his lips at him. "Must be one of them rich prick from the city. Sh'said his name's Kurt." The way he slurred his words more than usual meant it was _way too early_ for both Dixons.

Merle chuckled and started shredding a napkin. "Not sure that's gonna fly for ol' Earl. And she's way too redneck to keep a 'Kurt'." 

Daryl hummed in his coffee. "Hey Merle, what's up with ya 'n Sally?" 

Merle stared at his brother. "What're ya on, lil' bro?" 

The kid gave him a shit eating grin. "Ya got a date, Mer'." And it wasn't a question. 

He huffed. "I ain't got no date, Daryl." He narrowed his eyes at his brother's smug face. 

"I know ya got a date. Carol told me." He looked down at the table and Merle knew he was actually pouting. "How come ya ain't told me?" he muttered with a sigh and put his chin in his folded arms. 

Merle looked away, hiding a smile. Daryl always tended to act like a kid having a tantrum when he didn't have his own way. "Ain't told ya 'cause there's no date, baby brother. Sally's jus' only comin' home t'night ta talk 'bout work." 

Daryl chuckled. "That what they call it now?" he teased. "Ya fucked her three times, Mer', 'n no one talks work in our house. It's a date." 

Merle shook his head. "Carol wants help in the office. Said Sally worked in some bank in Atlanta and knew a thing or two 'bout accountin' so ya wouldn't have ta do that shit anymore."

Daryl stared. "Ya cookin'?" he asked seriously, something hidden in his tone.

It was jealousy, Merle knew, but Daryl wasn't going to make a scene. Much less say it was bothering him that Merle was inviting a girl home. A girl he'd already been with several times. 

"Daryl, it ain't a date," he said after a while, nodding at Misty when she put their breakfast plates in front of them. 

He knew he sounded reassuring and that he didn't owe Daryl an explanation, but that was their way. Because in the end, Daryl'll always be first in Merle's life. Will always be the most important part. And nothing, no girl, no money, no murder will ever be enough to separate them or put a dent in their relationship. In truth, they acted more like a couple than two brothers had any right, but they were past caring and had stopped questioning it. The love would always be there, and they ignored anyone telling them otherwise.  

Daryl dropped a finger in the maple syrup on his pancakes and licked it suggestively, hollowing his cheeks and starting at Merle.

"You're disgustin', _Pookie_." 

Daryl giggled around his finger and grabbed a pancake, ignoring Merle's comment about table manners and cutlery. 

"I ain't cookin'," he answered after a long stretch of silence. "I jus' wanna hire her ta help Carol."

At Daryl's lascivious gaze, he sighed. "Yeah 'n maybe fuck her too." 

Daryl grinned and threw his napkin at Merle's head. 

0

Daryl made himself scarce that night, and Merle didn't know how to feel about it. Well, he knew he was glad to have some privacy with Sally, but that constant worry of a parent for their children when they didn't know where they were was always tugging at the back of his mind. 

Sally was loud and boisterous. Her laugher was a bit irritating and grating on his nerves, and she had a tendency to snort inelegantly when Merle said something she thought funny.

Everything he said, apparently.

Daryl really didn't have any worry about her, because she was everything Merle couldn't stand in the long run. But at least she was always willing for a good romp. 

"So Merle, where's your lil' shadow?" 

Merle took a deep sip of his beer and eyed her. "Out." 

She pinched her lips and sniffed. "Well, you gonna hire me or what?" 

Merle nodded. "Sure. Carol could use the help." 

Sally rolled her eyes and crossed her legs, and then her arms on her chest in indignation. Merle sneered around the neck of his beer bottle at her attitude. She acted like she was his girlfriend. She sure acted like it too. As soon as she'd entered the house, she'd started puttering around, tidying up and moving things. She'd even bought a bag of groceries with her and stocked the fridge before starting to cook. 

"You gonna live with your brother here all your life?" she asked finally, red nails drumming against her arm. 

Merle lifted an eyebrow at her. "What's it ta ya?" 

Her lip curled in barely concealed disgust. "I mean, don't you think a more…feminine presence here wouldn't be amiss?" she said slowly. "And isn't your brother old enough to have his own space now?" 

Merle stared at her with narrowed eyes. "And ya fancy yourself my wife now?" 

She glared. "You sure need one," she sneered. "Look at this place. It's a hovel." 

Merle stood and glared back. "Watch your fuckin' mouth, woman." He sure as hell wouldn't accept anyone telling him the first house he had called _'home'_ and where he raised his little brother was a dump.

She stood and faced him, face scrunched in a scowl. "What's your problem?! You ask me here to _talk_ about work and now you suddenly act all pissy at me! What's my problem? What's _yours_?!" 

Merle winced at her shrill voice and grimaced. Maybe he'd been a bit too bold with this one because he usually never slept with the same girl more than once to avoid those situations.  

Maybe Daryl had been right after all and it _was_ a date.

Ah, damn. 

"Wanna fuck?" 

0

Daryl came back around three in the morning and joined Merle in the kitchen quietly. He pushed the stool opposite him with an ankle around the foot of the chair and sat, his eyes trailing over Merle's face and lingering on the bruise adorning his cheekbone. 

Not saying anything, Merle pushed his mug of coffee to his brother and watched him drink it without taking his eyes from his face. 

"So, ya had a nice evenin'?" Merle asked after the silence started getting to him. 

Daryl blinked slowly and put a hand flat on the table. There was blood caked under his nails and he also had scratches on his face and neck.

Maybe for one of the first time in his life, Merle didn't want to know what happened. What Daryl had done. Who he'd certainly hurt. And Daryl wasn't forth coming with an explanation. 

Daryl only hummed his answer and Merle took his mug back. "So, ya might be our accountant for a while still." 

Daryl was chewing the inside of his lower lip, a clear sign of stress. "Ya love her?" 

Merle gave him a small smile. "Nah."

Daryl shook his head, clearly not satisfied with the answer. "Ya can 'ave her…" he whispered. 

Merle sighed and rubbed his face. "I don't want her Daryl. I got all I want 'ere." 

Daryl eyeballed him under his fringe, blue eyes partially hidden. "Ya can't waste your life for me, Mer'." 

Merle pinched his lips and glared at his brother. "I ain't wastin' my life with ya, Daryl."

Daryl started chewing on his thumb and rocking back and forth. "I jus' want ya ta be happy."

It was probably the first time in their lives they were having this kind of conversation. Before tonight, Merle would have never thought of finding himself in the middle of the night having a heart to heart with his little brother about his happiness.

He understood where Daryl was coming from, though. He'd always done everything he could for the kid, raised him, dealt with more shit than was possible and he sometimes saw the look of guilt cross his brother's eyes. He never wanted Daryl to feel like he owe him for doing what he'd always considered his job.

_Protect the baby._

That had always been his motto all his life.

He understood. People thought he was putting his life on the side by not getting hitched and still living with his brother while he was already forty. But he didn't care. Truth was, he knew it'd be his life until he died and he _wanted to_. He probably needed Daryl more than Daryl needed him.

Daryl had saved him. If the kid hadn't been born, he'd probably be in prison, or worse, dead from an overdose somewhere in some shoddy alley or killed by a dealer.   

He never saw his life as some sort of great sacrifice. He was probably the most selfish of the two Dixons in this one. Otherwise he wouldn't have adopted Daryl, he wouldn't have covered for his murderous breakdowns, and he wouldn't be working and living with the kid.

He was perfectly happy in this life, and he sure as hell didn't want Daryl to feel bad about his own choices.    

"I am happy."

Because truth was, Daryl could live without Merle. 

But Merle couldn't live without Daryl. 

0

The light of the TV was flickering chiaroscuro shadows on Daryl's face in the darkness of the living room. His sharp cheekbones, hallow eyes and strong jaw casting eerie promises on his face.

Merle forced himself not to start when Daryl's fingers trailed along the back of his neck to the top of his aching head. He hadn't flinched since he was a teen, and he sure as hell wasn't going to start again now, especially when his little brother was the one touching him.

He narrowed his bleary eyes at the TV but couldn't quiet catch what was happening, and the sound was muted so low Merle couldn't hear anything except a few words. Turning his eyes to the wall, he watched the tiny specks of dust drifting in the ray of sun though the window; dawn was slow to come in this scorching summer, and Merle longed for the respite of night and its coolness.

"You good?" Daryl whispered, clever fingers tracing the line of Merle's jaw, while his other hand—too hot, way too _hothothothot_ —was placed on his forehead and checking for fever.

"Tired," he muttered.

Daryl hummed and leaned over, nearly bending in half, and if Merle's energy wasn't so sapped by the flu, he'd have laughed at his brother's flexibility.

He felt weak, gross because he was sweating so much, an alien in his own skin, his head was pounding to no end, and he felt so nauseous he was scared that if he moved he'd throw up. He sighed and rubbed his cheek on Daryl's thigh where his head was pillowed and grunted. "I think I'm gunna _die_." 

Daryl snorted but started rubbing behind Merle's ear soothingly. Like a dog. But it felt good, so Merle couldn't really complain. " _I_ think you're overly dramatic." 

Merle snorted and winced immediately when it sent a pike of pain through his skull. "Don't ya feel sorry for your ol' Merle?"

Daryl snorted. "That's your own fault," he answered. "Who's got the flu in summer anyway?"

Merle closed his eyes and covered them with an arm, ignoring his completely unsympathetic brother. 

"Called Carol earlier," Daryl muttered, "told 'er we won't come in today."

Merle grunted. "Ya should go."

Daryl pursed his lips, not looking at Merle. "Ain't leaving ya."

He stared up at the kid and observed him for a moment. Daryl wasn't looking at him and was engrossed by the flickering images on the TV screen. There was a sense of stillness around him like Merle rarely saw anymore.

A bit like in his teen, right after the shock treatment in the hospital. Doctors and shrinks had been persuaded they'd cured him of his tendencies, and while they patted each other's backs over Daryl's drooling empty body, the kid had only been too out of it. He'd been amorphous and passive for a few months— _calm_ and _still_ in their words—but unchanged deep down.

Today, Merle felt like those years ago. Daryl was serene on the outside, but burning on the inside.    

"Ya know you're sick, baby bro, right?" he whispered after the silence became too heavy. 

Daryl tilted his head on the side and took a long moment before angling his face down to stare at Merle quickly before looking at the ceiling.

                                                                                                   

He looked ferocious. Wild. There was this ever present glint of craziness. He looked tired, dark shadows under his icy blue eyes. He was quiet, _motionless_ —so motionless it was eerie. He was unblinking, and at that moment, Merle could see all of his flaws written all over his face. His little beast born in scorching summer. His unstoppable, perfect baby brother who didn't take prisoners, but ate their souls instead. 

 

Daryl smiled then. Slow and stretching and unnatural as if it hurt.

_Of course he knew._

Couldn't escape the monster eating his brain. But he just didn't care.

And probably never would.

0

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please do not hesitate to tell me about typos or missing words :)


	4. I'll see what tomorrow brings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Incestuous kissing between Daryl and Merle.

0

For all of Daryl's antisocial behavior, he was pretty good at reading people.

And so, Merle couldn't help but feel annoyed at the ever present amused look in his baby brother's eyes as they were dragged from the police cruiser to the small precinct two towns over. The village they lived in was so small they didn't even have a police department or a mayor or anything at all really, and so depended on King County's forces.

And their dear pals Grimes and Walsh who seemed to have taken a liking to them or just plain wished to pine them with something and have a reason to put them in jail.

Daryl was staring at Merle as Grimes lead him to a detention cell and cuffed him to the sturdy iron bars, while Walsh dragged Merle to an interrogation room and pushed him none too gently on a chair.

He huffed in irritation and started drumming his fingers on the cheap table, wishing with all his might he hadn't listened to his stupid baby brother and hadn't followed him to the bar tonight.   

Walsh was grinning smugly as he dropped a thick file before Merle and took his time going through a few pages, completely ignoring Merle. Grimes was sitting on the other chair, silent and just observing passively. He looked irritated, but to Merle's surprise, he seemed angrier at his partner than at him. 

"So, Dixon, tell us," Walsh started, "why where you hanging out with Joe Danville?"

Merle lifted an eyebrow and shrugged slowly, tilting his head to the side. "Was hangin' out with my brother," he answered.

Walsh narrowed his eyes at him. "You're not stupid enough to believe we're gonna buy that, are you?" He looked down at the file and grabbed a piece of paper of several pages. "Larceny, assault and battery with aggravated violence, drugs detention, drugs use, drug dealing, several stint in juvies, then jail…my, my, my, you've been a busy boy, Dixon."

Merle thinned his lips and blinked at the man before shifting his eyes to Grimes blankly, and turning back to Walsh. "Ol' news, Officer," he drawled, "t'was nineteen years ago."

Walsh lifted an eyebrow. "You know the date precisely?" he mocked.

Merle smirked. "August 24th."

The man lifted an eyebrow and Merle could see his smartass answer was only serving to piss him off even more. "Ya got nothin' on me, jus' that I happened to drink a beer in the same bar as that asshole Danville."

And Merle wasn't stupid to dabble with the liked of Danville and his crew. They called themselves the Claimers and tended to take anything they wanted regardless of people and the law. They were a bunch of violent thugs, undisciplined and dangerous. Merle never really got closed to them, but knew Joe from passing. They greeted each other from afar but never interacted since the man tried to recruit Daryl a few years ago. Their mutual respect was born the day Merle broke every single bone in the hand of Joe's second in command.

Daryl could have taken care of himself but would have probably triggered a war between them and the Claimers, and Merle sure as hell didn’t want to live in fear and having to check over his shoulder every minute of the damn day. Joe had respected his wish not to get involved as well as Daryl and left them alone since that day.

Merle knew Joe only surrounded himself with _willing followers_. If Merle and Daryl had been enrolled by force, it would have represented a threat to the gang from the inside, and the man was smart enough to avoid that. And Merle had seen the look Joe had sported the second his man had tried to enroll Daryl. He had recognized the glint in his baby brother's eyes and had seen the danger immediately. He wouldn't say Joe was scared of Daryl, but the kid sure as hell was too much of a loose cannon for the Claimers.

So tonight, Daryl and Merle had been relaxing in their usual bar, not blinking when they saw the Claimers were there and just sat away from them. But then, the police had come down, yelling and arresting more than one member of the gang, as well as the Dixon brothers. Joe hadn't been arrested and Merle knew the police was just grasping at straws on this operation. They probably had some small charges on some members of the Claimers but nothing on Danville himself.

"C'mon Dixon, ya gonna tell me it was a huge misunderstanding?"

Merle stared at him. "Ya gonna charge me with something?" he asked instead, his eyes once more sliding to Grimes. "What 'bout my baby brother?" Walsh seemed slightly surprised to hear him ask about his brother and Merle wanted to sneer at the idiot.

The man looked at his partner for a moment, as if at loss of words, but Grimes didn't step up to help his partner and Walsh thinned his lips in clear anger before turning back to glare at Merle. "I can keep you locked up for public intoxication and disruption."

Merle rolled his eyes. "Really?" he muttered and sighed in pure exasperation. "Aw'right. Give me my phone call now," he snapped.

Walsh grinned smugly again. "Sorry. After eleven at night, phone calls are reported to the day after. First thing in the morning you'll get your phone call," he smirked. 

Merle looked impassively at the man. "Ya can make up all the charges ya want, man, but I know my rights. Now, give me my phone call."

Walsh grimaced and stood, stalking to the door and leaving the room angrily, like a petulant kid. Merle rubbed the bridge of his nose, feeling the headache pounding behind his eyelids. Maybe his bout with the flu wasn't over after all.

"I'll walk you to the phone and your detention cell," Grimes finally said after a moment, standing and waiting for Merle.

He looked up and stared at the man in revulsion. "That how you pigs work now?" he sneered. "Ya don't like someone, so ya arrest them for no reason? That the kind of cop ya are, Grimes? Your kid proud of his daddy?"

Grimes paled slightly and tightened his lips together, narrowing his eyes at him and seemingly trying to figure Merle out. "You can file a complaint, if you want," he offered calmly after a long internal fight.

Merle knew all about internal fights.

Hell, he lived with Daryl and the kid was a fucking ticking time bomb, always containing himself and fighting against that dark sludge inside him. He saw the fight happening in Grimes. The man was strong, he could give him that, but not as strong as Daryl who was born with the darkness. Grimes only picked it up along the road and didn't embrace it like his little brother.

For a man like Merle, who spent more than half his life observing and filing away details on inner struggle and concealed violence, Grimes was an open book. His wore his darkness for all to see and didn't hide his violence very well. Or at least, not to someone like Merle, and not to his baby brother; Daryl would eat him alive.

"I jus' hope your partner ain't touched my baby brother," he muttered as he stood and followed Grimes to the phone.

0

Carol didn't look happy to have been woken in the middle of the night to post bail for the Dixon brothers. She was wearing her old pair of work boots over her pink pajamas and a haphazardly thrown-on coat. Her hair was a mess and she wasn't wearing make-up.

Strangely enough, Merle thought she looked nice. He never felt anything more than strong friendship for her, but he couldn't deny her strangely odd beauty. She glared at him through the bars of the cell and sighed in displeasure. "What did you do, Merle?" she snapped as she signed dozens of forms, completely ignoring Walsh's rudeness and Grimes silent presence behind her.

Merle looked at her, feeling offended. "I ain't done nothin', woman," he hissed and turned to glare at Daryl when the kid snorted a laugh.

Carol looked behind Merle and smiled gently at Daryl. "Are you okay, honey?" she asked.

Merle groaned and rolled his eyes with his entire body. "How come I get accused of doin' anythin', and the _baby_ get the _honey_ , uh? How fair is that?" he growled, taking a tiny amount of pleasure at Daryl's irritation at his use of the _'baby'_ nickname.   

Carol sighed tiredly. "Because, Merle, you're the one who called me in the middle of the freakin' night so I could post bail," she snapped. "And I sure expect a raise come Monday."

Merle glared at her and huffed and puffed until Grimes opened to cell door and let them out. He still thanked Carol with a one armed hug and silently accepted his wallet and keys from Grimes. Daryl was doing the same with his body slightly angled toward him. He looked tired and annoyed, previous amusement gone from his hard face, and Merle wondered what the cops said to him when they interrogated him.

He hoped Daryl hadn't slipped.

They walked to the main entrance and Merle caught sight of Sophia sitting in the uncomfortable chair at the entrance. She perked up when she saw her mother and ran to them, hugging Carol, then Merle's legs, then jumping in Daryl's arms and linking her small arms around his neck.

Strangely enough, Daryl liking Carol had extended to her daughter. It was a pretty incredible thing in Merle's book, because Daryl hated kids more than cops. Sophia had been two when Carol had started working at the garage, and at first, the woman couldn't do anything but bring the kid with her. Merle hadn't said anything because the girl was quiet and well behaved, but he hadn't been able to hide his unease when he saw the kid toddle and gravitate around Daryl more and more.

But Daryl wouldn't be his beloved baby brother if he couldn't surprise Merle anymore, and had taken a direct liking to Sophia. They were thick as thieves, and sometimes Merle wondered if Sophia wasn't literally Daryl's best friend. Now the kid was seven and saw Daryl as her hero.

"Alright, let's go," Carol said after thanking the cops.

Merle stared at Walsh, then at Grimes and finally left, following Daryl patiently explaining to Sophia why they were in a police precinct. He wasn't sure if calling the cops _'pigs'_ in front of a seven years old was a good idea, as well as saying they were a bunch of assholes, but Carol didn't seem fazed.

It felt familiar to Merle. He had his baby brother safe and well, and a friend that Daryl actually liked.

It was nice.

0                    

Daryl bore his love for Merle tattooed in his skin—two demons climbing up the ladder of his back seemingly trying to reach the top but never really able to. That represented their lives in a gross sense of humor, and that was the vision filling Merle's eyes as he was woken from a deep, dreamless sleep.

He blinked into the dark bedroom, not understanding what woke him in the middle of the night. At first, he thought it was just the storm that had been brewing for days and finally broken out early in the previous evening, but then the noise continued and he quickly realized it was pounding on the door.

A particularly loud crack of thunder, quickly followed by sharp lightening illuminated the whole bedroom, and Merle saw Daryl next to him, still asleep. The kid was on his stomach, head turned away from Merle and an arm under his head. For some reason, Daryl never slept with a pillow and preferred to rest right on the mattress, or on a limb…or on Merle.

Still groggy from sleep, but getting more and more operational as the thick fog of sleep dissipated, he finally sat up and rubbed his face tiredly. He shivered slightly in the cool bedroom and instinctively draped the thick comforter over Daryl. 

He heard the pounding again and slipped out of bed, getting his cold feet into his boots and not bothering grabbing anything else. He walked down the stairs in his white boxers, trying not to make too much nose on the squeaking stairs and stopped at the bottom, considering.

For a violent moment of deep wrenched gut panic, he thought it was the cops coming to arrest Daryl because they finally found something to pine him to the many crimes he'd committed, but then he heard a feminine voice calling his name and he nearly fell down on his ass in relief.

He scowled and stalked to the door angrily, because, _what girl in their right mind would come knocking at the Dixon house in the middle of a storm?_ and wrenched the door open, his anger multiplying at the freezing gush of wind slapping him in the face.

"Merle."

Merle narrowed his eyes and sneered. "Sally, what the hell?" he growled.

She giggled and pushed herself drunkenly into the house, nearly falling down on the way. Merle glared at her, but the angle was all wrong because she was squinting at the floor and not at his face. He closed the door and pushed her none too gently to the kitchen, gritting his teeth as the noise she was making. She slumped into one of the chair and flicked her drenched hair over her shoulder like she always did, but the effect totally failed because she looked more like a drowned raccoon than a woman. Her make-up was flicking down her eyes, her hair were limp and her dress had gone see-through with water.

"What're ya doin' here?" he snapped after she seemed more composed.

She pursed her lips, grimaced and crossed her arms over her chest. "I came to talk to you," she slurred. "You didn't call me back, so I came here. Why didn't you call me back? I thought we were a thing!" she hissed and narrowed her eyes at him.

Merle stared, and stared again for good measure before scoffing. "Woman, I tol' ya last time, we're not _a thing_ ," he spat, disgusted by the term, "we never were. T'was jus' fuckin'."

She puffed her cheek and sniffed, and Merle tensed, because, god, what was he supposed to do now if she started crying? He reckoned they'd parted with a pretty clear idea of where their _relationship_ was. She hit him and told her not to bother coming back. End of the story. He liked to fool around with her, but didn't need, _didn't want_ to make a life with her, and seeing her today confirmed what he'd felt that day they separated.

Somewhere in the back of his head, he'd thought about settling down, be it with her or not, but the idea had been there. Now, with distance, he clearly couldn't see where his head had been at that day, because women were so much work and so many problems, always bitching, and wanting, and ordering, and crying.

He didn't feel the need _to settle_. He guessed he was too independent for that. He loved his freedom and his way of life. He didn't need to report to Daryl to do whatever he wanted like he would have to do with a woman. His brother was so easy to live with.

"Don't lie, Merle!" she suddenly screamed and he cringed because there was no way Daryl could still be asleep after that. "I know you love me! I know it, and we're meant to be together."

He grimaced and shook his head. "Are you out of your freakin' mind, Sally?" he sighed and rubbed his forehead. "You're drunk, sleep it off on the couch t'night, 'n I'll call ya a cab t'morrow."

He looked to the kitchen doorway when he heard shuffling and the corner of his mouth lifted ruefully at Daryl's appearance. "Hey, lil' bro."

                                                                                          

Daryl walked to Merle and leaned against the counter, crossing his arms and staring impassively at Sally. He'd put a tee-shirt on, but Merle could see the goose bumps on his skin. The kid blinked slowly before looking up at Merle with a raised eyebrow, question clear in his eyes.

"She's drunk," he explained, "I'll call her a cab t'morrow." Daryl stared at her a long moment, then licked his lips, and Merle felt himself tense. "Dare, go back to bed, 'kay?"

The kid's eyes darkened and for a moment Merle was scared something might happen and he'd be unable to stop it. He didn't have many rules apart from not killing children, but killing into their house was a firm no-go and Daryl knew it. 

They stared at each other for a long moment before Daryl turned around and left the room while singing under his breath. " _I can't decide whether you should live or die…_ "

0

Blood was hard to wash. Merle had known this from an early age…before the craziness, before _Daryl_. 

He frowned at his hands and his lips curled at the red liquid dropping down the drain. He tried to ignore Carol's berating next to him, her mutter more annoying than anything else as she looked through the first aid kit and he glared every few minutes at Daryl's mocking.

The kid was perched on the counter and they were all gathered in the small stuffy break room of the garage while Merle tried to ignore the world. Even Bundy was looking at him as if he was pathetic, and the damn mutt was only sitting at Daryl's feet blinking stupidly.

"I swear you Dixons will drive me crazy," Carol muttered as she pushed Merle to the table and started applying peroxide and dressing his hand with white bandages. She quickly finished her work and walked out the room without a backward glance at them.

Merle started at his hand, flexed his finger to test the binding and pursed his lips. Damn tool had skidded against something in the engine he'd been fixing and the screwdriver had gone through his flesh like butter. The pain wasn't really what bothered him, but the blood was.

It seemed blood was in everything the Dixons did, and he couldn't quite catch a break. He wasn't squirmy at the sight—couldn't afford it really, not when some days, Daryl came back from wherever he was covered in it—but he didn't want to trigger something in his little brother's screwed up head.

He gritted his teeth at the sight of Bundy licking the drops of blood on the floor where it'd dripped and sighed, rubbing his forehead with his unwounded hand. He felt Daryl move behind him, wrapping his arms around his shoulders in a hug, before the kid pressed a cigarette against his lips and rubbed the side of his face against Merle's. "'kay?" he whispered.

Merle grunted around the cigarette and chewed on it annoyingly.   

"Blood's not a trigger," Daryl hissed in his ear threateningly.

Not against Merle. Not really. He'd never been afraid of Daryl, but sometimes his sickness bled in his ' _brother character_ ' and he acted with Merle like he acted with other people and didn't realize he acted differently.

Merle didn't like to ponder on it. Didn't like to acknowledge the fact that Daryl acting in a degree of what Merle's and the rest of the world considered _normal_ was actually hurting his baby brother. The strain he had to feel, the risk of slipping and arouse suspicion in people inclined to dig a little bit deeper into the dark dirty family secret of the Dixon brothers.

He didn't think Daryl was _scared_ of being discovered.

No, somewhere in his twisted mind, there must be a thrill of being find out some day by someone smarter. But to this day, Merle never encountered someone as brilliant as his baby brother. It was like a giant chess game Daryl started from birth. He's taken years and years to place his pieces and now was only starting to get into the real matter of the game.

It was exhilarating and terrifying at the same time.

0

The nurse was young and pinched lipped as she examined Merle's hand crossly.

Merle knew her type.

She dreamt big when younger, maybe tried med school, but ended up a nurse in some shoddy clinic in Hickville, Georgia. She probably thought Merle and Daryl were here to score some prescription Oxy, and would assuredly spent her lunch time gossiping with her friends about the two rednecks in room 8.

She applied dry gauze and barely looked in his direction when speaking. "The doctor will be here in a few minutes."

It was barely polite, bordering rude, and she left them to wait.

He sighed in annoyance and looked around the room, his lips lifting slightly as he watched Daryl go through the cabinets and drawers curiously. The kid made a nose of triumph and turned around with a tiny smirk.

Merle lifted an eyebrow at the stethoscope and only rolled his eyes when Daryl started using it on himself before frowning and walking to Merle to try it out.

"How ol' are ya, _baby_ brother?" he muttered.

Daryl shushed him with a glare and pressed the cool disk against Merle's chest. He hated being in this kind of place. He could remember the numerous times his mother had to go to a clinic to get something—bones, skin, teeth—repaired after one of her husband's beatings.

The nurses and doctors had been all the same as today, dispassionate, uncaring, and cold in front of a woman's suffering, too used to this kind of scene.

He remembered the one time he had to get fixed when he was twelve and had his nose broken so badly his mother hadn't been able to do anything about it and had to bring him here, knowing she'd receive another beating afterwards.

He remembered CPS examining Daryl, humming in detachment and filling in forms to catalog and document signs of abuse and justify Merle's demand for custody. He remembered Daryl's tired eyes, his ashen face under black bruises, his stoic face cracking under the pressure and the sheer need to scream and claw at everything and everyone.

He shifted on the chair and rubbed his eyes with his good hand, trying to shake off the bad memories. He hated those places. Everything was too white, too clean, too damn terrifying, because they mostly made him remember empty eyes, electrical burns on temples and drowning little kids.

He guessed Daryl's particularly agitated fidgeting was also due to those memories. The kid couldn't stand still and paced around the room, waiting for the doctor, sometimes flinching, sometimes tilting his head as if listening to some unknown voice. Merle thought he shouldn't have brought him here. He thought about what Daryl would need to do to unwind from such a restless state.

The door opened and a guy in his mid-sixties walked to Merle, nodding in greeting, eyes on his file. He muttered something and started working quickly and efficiently, cleaning the wound, dragging pus and stitching his hand back in neat rows and applying fresh bandages. He only seemed to hesitate a bit as he took his prescription pad, glancing quickly in Daryl's direction worryingly. It pissed Merle off. It annoyed him more than words would be able to describe, but he could _understand_.

Daryl was chewing on his thumb frantically, arms crossed on his chest. He was jittery, his breathing was uneven, he was flinching at every little noises, and his eyes darted everywhere in the room, too quick to fix a point.

He showed every sign of an addict in withdrawal, and Merle couldn't really fault the doctor from thinking they'd schemed the accident with his hand to get legal drugs.

He pinched his lips and narrowed his eyes at the man, startling him out of his own musing and quickly scribing down the white pad. "Two in the mornings and evenings for a week," he said coldly, eyes drifting to Daryl who had silently walked closer to them to glance above Merle's shoulder. "Keep the stitches dry and clean."

Merle nodded and took the prescription, standing and walking to the door, Daryl following quickly behind, nearly stuck to his back.

He glanced one last time at the doctor and met his eyes.

He wondered if he recognized him from all those years ago. Merle sure as hell recognized _him_.

0             

Daryl's first words hadn't been something original or big and worthy of being carefully compiled in them stupid baby books. 

That day, their mother was too drunk and too busy avoiding her husband, and their dad couldn't care less if his stupid retarded second born finally decided to open his damn mouth. 

Merle had been glad.

At least now he had known Daryl wasn't a mute but just didn't like to talk.

In truth, the boy made noises.

He grunted, growled, hummed, and sometimes even giggled. But he guessed knowing Daryl _could_ talk but just chose not to, was a way to avoid too many questions and avoid rising anyone's suspicion about the Dixon household. 

So, three years old Daryl, sitting on top of the kitchen counter watching Merle heat up some soup, turned his messy ash blond head to the doorway when he heard their mother shuffling into the room, dragging her feet tiredly and drunkenly, and stared at her impassively, hard blue gaze like steel and sharper than diamond. 

Merle ignored her, and gently pushed Daryl's tiny body so it slid against his side. He placed himself so he was encasing him between his muscled arms and made a silly face at Daryl's inquiring face, smiling crookedly when the kid giggled. 

The woman grunted under her breath, her face—once pretty, maybe—now twisted by deep marks due to harsh life, alcohol and too many beatings, prematurely wrinkled, and her hair was limp and gray, her nose was crooked, her teeth yellowed and blackened by smoke and coffee. She glared at them and grabbed a cheap bottle of whisky in one of the cupboard. "Shut that freak up, Merle, or else," she rasped angrily after Daryl continued giggling as Merle pocked his tummy. 

Merle pinched his lips as he turned to glare at her, but quickly smiled at Daryl when he felt small fingers trail along his cheeks and teeny tiny arms wrap around his neck. "t's okay, Mer'," he whispered in his ear. His voice was stilted and botched, like he had an accent. Like he was tasting the words on his lips and out loud for the first time. 

Merle blinked a long time, maybe tears, maybe not, arms too tight around the kid but neither of them minding.

0

Daryl didn't hide his scars. Walked bare chested and probably did it on purpose too, Merle thought. People felt uneasy, fearful. Daryl's chest and back were covered in them. 

Merle wasn't stupid, had never been, but he never thought the scars left on the body of a six years old would proportionally spread as he grew. The scar Daryl had on his collarbone from shoulder to shoulder was long now, puckered and angry looking. The ones on his chest were uneven because they were never properly healed and really damaged his skin. His back was a nightmare of raised red ones, flat and white ones, long and short. And Merle still found cigarettes burns on his little brother's skin even today.

Those scars made him look rough, violent, strong.  Not vulnerable like some might think, but then again, Daryl rarely looked vulnerable. It made him look like a survivor rather than a victim. He didn't feel ashamed of the marks on his body and used them to further his need to keep people away from him. 

On the contrary, Merle could never accept his own scars and saw them as proof of his own lacking, his own _weakness_ and inability to protect his brother and himself. 

That had always been their lives…and it was fact.

0

Sometimes, Daryl checked out.

He stood there, breathing, _hothothothot_ , but completely empty. As if he drifted off and left his body behind, like an empty shell. Those spells were rare. Merle could remember them all, and thank God, they never happened where anyone else could see.

Otherwise, Daryl sure as hell would be locked away forever this time. 

0

Uncle Jess had been Merle's hero for many years.

He was everything he wished his own daddy was. He taught him to fight, to swear, to hunt and to protect himself. He had been Merle's protector for many years, often spending weeks with them and basically always diverting Will Dixon's wrath on something other than his wife and son. 

Merle was fifteen, at his adult height and gaining muscle every day. At that age, his father had stopped hitting him because Merle broke his nose and nearly all of his face. He nearly didn't stop hitting the man's head against the wall, but one look at his pregnant mother made him freeze.

She would never make it with a dead husband and a son in jail. And the baby inside her sure as hell would never survive with her as its only caregiver. He'd dropped the man, sneered at her crying, pathetic form attempting to comfort her husband and called uncle Jess to tell him he'd nearly killed his daddy.

The man came to pick him up and took him on a month long road trip.

When Daryl was born, he wasn't around so much anymore. Merle didn't know if it was because he didn't need him as much now that he wasn't a little defenseless boy, but he strongly suspected the reason _was_ Daryl himself. 

Uncle Jess was a typical redneck and he believed in all those crazy old women's tales about devil and cursed people. He took one look at the newborn and swore him off his life, denying he was kin and blood.

Daryl never cared; in fact, the kid only liked Merle and ignored the rest of world.

When Daryl was four, Jess decided to take Merle on a hunting trip but refused to take the little boy with them. Merle refused to let the kid alone in the house with their daddy, so Jess reluctantly agreed on condition that the kid was quiet and kept his mouth shut at all times. It didn't really matter because Daryl didn't talk to anyone.

More days than not, Merle considered himself more of Daryl's father than his brother, and that day in the woods wasn't any different. While Jess trudged silently in front of them with his rifle on his arm, Merle quietly taught Daryl the finest points of tracking and hunting. The kid was focused, his whole self drinking-up every little pieces of information, small hands gripping Merle's shirt or pants.     

Jess being there wasn't even registering in Merle's head as he spent his time teaching his little brother.

He loved those quiet moments, when he felt like he did something actually useful with his life. Teaching Daryl things like self-reliance, hunting for his own meal, tracking a prey or teaching him to fare if he got lost in the woods…Merle often felt useless and he'd heard about his own uselessness all his life, but Daryl never made him feel like some degenerate piece of white trash.

Daryl had made him feel important and useful from the day he was born, and that was the most precious thing Merle had ever had his entire life. Being Daryl's protector was everything to Merle, and in some strange way, he owed his little brother his life.

"Never want'd ta live ol' Georgia?" Jess asked gruffly that night, deer leg roasting on a pike in the fire in front of them.

Merle didn't look up from his stew, felt Daryl's tiny body flinch between his legs at the unexpected sound of the man's voice and shrugged. "Ta go where?" he muttered.

Daryl was eating his stew with his hands, licking his fingers clean and not bothering with the dirt and dust on his body or under his nails. His face was nearly brown from dirt and his ash blond hair were dark with sweat and matted with filthy knots. He needed a bath, desperately, and Merle felt a twinge of guilt deep in his gut at the sight of such a little boy being so neglected that his own parents didn't see fit to wash him. He promised himself to take Daryl to the creek tomorrow and scrub him clean.  

The kid groaned angrily at a piece of meat and spat it right back on his palm, lifting it up to his brother with furious eyes. He clearly couldn't chew through the nerve and Merle grabbed it, munched on it for a moment before giving it back to the kid who didn't hesitate to put back in his mouth. Food was food, and the Dixon boys had been so used to have food held out on them they couldn't afford to turn their noses up at it. Daryl had been raised with the knowledge that having _anything at all_ was to be deserved with pain and blood, food being the most important one. 

He saw Jess shake his head in disgust, and for a moment all Merle wanted to do was bash his head in. The man often defended Merle from the worst of his father's abuse, but he was still a firm believer in raising children with an iron fist, especially boys like Merle that he considered should get toughened up from an early age. Jess and Will had been raised with fists, and it seemed his disliking for Daryl ran deeper than Merle thought. He probably considered the little boy as a weakling, saw him as nothing but a waste of space and energy. In his twisted logic, Jess probably saw Daryl as the reason Merle had refused to enter Jess' starting business of moonshine dealing.

It didn't matter in the long run. Daryl will always come first. He'd make the boy as strong as he could but never with his fist. He'd promised himself he'd never hurt his little brother the moment Daryl had been placed in his arms. 

Three months later, Jess got his head blown off by the cops in a raid.

Merle took the news rather well, knew it could happen in such a risky business. 

But then he saw the deep satisfaction in Daryl's eyes.

And he started wondering…

0

Bundy dying was one of the first times he saw Daryl express any feeling for anyone or anything other than Merle himself.

The dog had been old but stubborn, and it never really crossed Merle's mind to have the beast die on them. He's actually gotten quite used to the mutt, and while they'd never liked each other, Merle had consented to share his little brother with it, and they'd reached a common understanding when the both of them got they each wanted Daryl's safety above everything else.

It might be strange to strike a deal with a dog, but Merle's life had gotten so strange he didn't even care. The dog had made Daryl happy, and he's rather cut his own hand with a blunt hacksaw than take away anything that made the kid feel anything other than aloofness.    

He smoked as he watched Daryl dig a hole to bury his dog. He'd found Bundy on Daryl's bed that morning, unmoving and snot frozen and quickly understood the dog had died in his sleep. He didn't know how to feel about such a quiet death. He knew he felt slightly relieved the mutt hadn't suffered, but the Dixons were so used to great violence and pain that Bundy dying peacefully had been a surprise.

He looked up at the sound of a car driving up the dust road to their house and narrowed his eyes when he realized who it was.

The two officers stepped out, Grimes resting behind against the car with his arms crossed, while the bastard one strode cockily in Merle's direction. The man was glancing above his shoulder to stare at Daryl digging and stopped at the foot of the stairs, looking up at Merle. "Burying bodies, Dixon?" he asked with narrowed eyes.

Merle blew a cloud of smoke in his direction and watched Grime walk to Daryl silently, kneeling to look under the tarp warped around Bundy's body. He could see Grimes say something to Daryl who didn't respond and just continue his work, body glistening with sweat under the hard Georgia sun. "My lil' brother's dog died," he simply answered, and turned his head to look over the forest.      

Walsh hummed and rocked slightly on his heels, really starting to piss Merle off. "There a reason ya 'n your pal are 'ere?" he asked brusquely, taking another cigarette.

The man smirked and rubbed his nose with his thumb. "Was just driving in the neighborhood, thought we'd say hi." He laughed quietly. "Didn't think we'd interrupt such an…emotional day."  

Merle gritted his teeth. He wanted to knock some of those teeth to get that bastard smirk out of his face. He wouldn't have any pig make Daryl's pain sound so trivial and turn it into a joke. But he didn't want to give that moron the satisfaction to lock him up. He looked up when he heard boots crunch on the gravel and met Grimes's eyes under his hat. "We actually came here because our car makes a strange noise, and we know you and your brother are mechanics," he said slowly, eyes shifting to Shane, narrowing just so, something strange and stony in the blue of them.

Merle lifted an eyebrow at the man's behavior and thought, not for the first time, that there was a lot more to that Grimes pig than met the eyes. He didn't get the crazy feeling he got from Daryl, but there really was something very cold about the man. And it seemed his partner was totally oblivious and clueless to it.

The excuse was farfetched but Merle just shrugged and followed them to the car, lifting the hood and getting to work silently. It didn't take long for him to spot the problem, and he briefly wondered who took care of those cars' maintenance if a spark plug being unplugged had never shocked anyone.

Officer bastard's cellphone rang and he quickly stepped away from them to answer. By the way he lowered his tone and voice, Merle knew he had to talk to some chick and lifted an eyebrow when he saw Grimes' face darken and that familiar glint he knew too well flash quickly in his eyes.

Maybe he'd been wrong. 

Maybe Grimes was as crazy as Daryl after all.

And not for the first time, Merle wondered who he'd seriously pissed off in some other life to end up surrounding by a bunch of psychotic morons.

Merle rubbed his forehead and ignored the cop as he leaned against the hood of his car with crossed arms, and looked toward Daryl. The kid was finished, standing still in front of his dog's grave, back and chest glistering with sweat and his scars in full display for anyone to see. Merle couldn't help the small shudder from travelling down his spine and looked away, taking a cigarette and lighting it.

"Sorry 'bout your dog," Grimes said after a moment.

Merle shrugged. "Wasn't mine. Sh'tupid mutt ain't never liked me."

Grimes snorted and Merle looked at him sideways. "Ya gotta stop buttin' your nose in our business, Chief," he muttered. "T's getting' fuckin' old."

The cop nodded slowly, looking sheepish for a short while before grimacing. "I got no problem with you and your brother," he assured. "But my partner's sure as hell got something against you too."

Merle shrugged. "Well, wouldn't be the first time people don't like us jus' for bein' Dixons."

Grimes gritted his teeth. "I try to run interference. He's certain you're some kind of great meth dealer and made it his career goal to take you down."

Merle chuckled. "Gone 'n done with this shit a long time ago, Officer."

Grimes looked above his shoulder and stared at Daryl. "For him?"

Merle nodded. "I made a shit load of mistakes in my life, but Daryl's my greatest success. Ya got ta know there isn't anythin' I wouldn't do for my baby brother." He didn't make his words sound particularly threatening, but they both were too smart not to ignore the heavy silence between them.

Grimes nodded slowly. "I get it. Not long ago I would have said the same 'bout him," he said, jerking his chin toward Walsh. "Not anymore," he muttered.

Merle laughed. "Man, only pussy can make a man hate like that. I feel for ya."

Grimes laughed with him and shrugged. "What can I say?" he chuckled. "I fucking hate it when someone takes what's mine."

Merle nodded silently. The chick Walsh was talking on the phone with was probably that woman, and from what he understood, it wasn't so much about his wife having an affair with his partner that was the problem, but having what Grimes considered _his_ being taken away.

"Ya doin' somethin' 'bout that?" Merle asked around his cigarette.   

Grimes hummed. "Not sure."

Merle nodded slowly. "Should take 'im huntin', great game this time of year. Unfortunately, accidents happen very quickly." He paused and looked up at Grimes. "'Cause 'f poor lightin'," he précised.

Grimes stared at him before shaking his head with a laugh. "Poor lighting…" he repeated in amusement.

Merle turned when he felt Daryl's silent presence materialize at his side, and he rubbed the dirt from his little brother's cheek with a gentle finger. "'kay?" he asked quietly.

Daryl pursed his lips, narrowing his blue eyes at Grimes before turning back to Merle and taking the cigarette right out of his mouth to take a deep drag on it. "Mmm-hmm," he hummed in response.

Merle draped an arm around his waist and squeezed, feeling Grimes' eyes on them.

0

"Can't believe you dragged me here," Daryl muttered under his breath, cigarette dangling precariously from his lips. It was a wonder it wasn't falling, and Merle humorously thought it was pretty accurate to Daryl's mood.

"Cheer up, lil' D," he chuckled, "ya used ta love fishin' when ya was small." 

Daryl slowly turned his head to stare at Merle and glared, head slowly reclining back against the plank of the old wooden boat. "Don't see why ya had to drag me down 'ere at the crack of dawn for _fishies_ , Mer'," he muttered, covering his eyes with an arm. He was shivering, and Merle pursed his lips. He'd decided to take Daryl here on a whim, but hadn't anticipated the early fall morning to be quite this chilly. "We don't even like fish," he added after a moment.

Merle shrugged and looked back at the calm water, his hold on the fishing rod tightening slightly. He didn't react when he felt Daryl's scalding arms wrap around his waist and his head rest at the small of his back. "Sorry, Mer', I'm bein' shitty, 'n I know ya only wanted ta make me happy."

Merle hummed but still patted one of Daryl's forearm picking out of his poncho. "T's okay."

Daryl snorted humorlessly behind him and tightened his arms. "Nah, ya take too much shit from me."

Merle chuckled slightly and clucked his tongue. "N' don't ya forget it."

They lapsed in silence, Merle silently watching his bait and Daryl quietly dozing against his back.

Sometimes, in those moments, Merle forgot. Honest to god forgot his little brother wasn't just a sweet kid…wasn't a _good_ man.

And it didn't matter.

0

Merle had watched Georgia dramatically change with times. He was sitting in a booth in a dim lighted corner of one of the bar they usually went to after work, a few towns over, and Merle couldn't help but sneer at the people crowding the place.

College kids, business men, workers, hell, even cops out with their buddies having a few beers with after their shifts.

A few years ago the place was full of only dirty rednecks and hard looking bikers, and _normal_ people were too scared to step foot inside bars like that.

But times changed. 

And now, Merle had to endure their presence. Like shameless, barely legal girls flirting, looking for the thrill, for something different. Something dangerous. Or tipsy married women, complaining about their absent husbands and batting their lashes at him, licking their drunken lips.

But worse than that, now Merle had not only to watch out for girls buzzing around Daryl too closely to touch, but also _men_ . And fuck, Merle knew Daryl liked to dabble into things that could get his rocks off and whatever sounded dirty, but _good God_ , those disgusting fags were all over his baby brother trying to get him in their bed to _fuck him_.

And that, Merle would never agree.

He accepted— _barely—_ for Daryl to be the one doing the fucking, but knowing another man was actually putting his dirty and greedy hands on _his_ kid?

Goddamn, it made him sick.  

His hand tightened on the neck of his beer bottle at the college boy approaching Daryl, confidently smiling and sending a smirk at his group of friends at the table behind.

Merle knew, _knew_ those assholes had made a bet about his little brother. See if their friend could bag the pretty redneck and take him for a quickie in the bathroom.

He watched the blond boy with a too bright smile slid in the stool next to Daryl, catching his attention with a finger slowly running along his bare arm. Immediately, Merle felt sick satisfaction at the boy's slight flinch when touching Daryl's scorching skin, but that satisfaction quickly vanished when he saw Daryl winced oh so slightly at the touch. Merle doubted the boy had noticed, but for a man who raised and lived with him, the flinch was pretty obvious.

Merle found a new reason to hate the guy for making his brother flinch in a place where he normally felt relatively at ease.

He stood and walked to the bar slowly, enough to hear the conversation the man was trying to engage with Daryl. "Hey man, couldn't help but notice…you look pretty lonely here."

Merle rolled his eyes inwardly and promptly sat on the empty stool on the other side of Daryl and took on his most menacing glare as his face blanked and hardened. "Hands off, ya lil' shit," he growled, leaning over Daryl protectively with a sneer. 

He put an arm on the back of Daryl chair, making sure to touch his baby brother's back and put the other one on the bar. College boy paled at the blatant threat, and Merle felt a satisfied thrill course through him. "Hey, man, I—I'm sorry, I—"

Merle narrowed his eyes but didn't correct him on the assumption and his sneer deepened. "Get away from 'im," he growled.

College boy didn't even look back and promptly ran back to his buddies. Merle scoffed in annoyance and glared at them all for a while, before turning on his stool and lifting his hand at the bartender for something stronger than beer. "Fuckin' fags," he muttered after downing a first shot and swallowing the second one just as quickly.

"Dare," Merle grunted after slamming his glass on the counter, eyes narrowed. Daryl only stared at him mutely, his cat-slanted eyes barely open and a satisfied smirk on his lips. He didn't seem bothered by their position, still encircled by Merle's arms and now his legs. "What're ya playin' at, now?" Merle huffed.

Daryl pursed his lips and blinked slowly with his head tilted slightly on the side—the picture of innocence, slowly leaning on the bar in front of him and putting his chin on his crossed arms. Merle bit down a laugh, that little guilt trip wouldn't work on him, Merle knew him by heart since he was born. "C'mon, don't pout, baby," he said lowly, turning his head to watch the bartender argue with a questionably legal boy asking for a shot of whisky.

                                                                                          

He looked so young, Merle wondered if Daryl had ever looked like that. He guessed life had been too hard and harsh on them to really make them appear young. Some days, Merle felt like he'd been born old, other days— _practically every day_ —he wished to have been able to take Daryl far, far away from all that shit and offer him the life he deserved. Just erase all those scars on his body and his mind.

He wondered— _too much/too often_ —if Daryl would have been so unhinged with a normal family. With a loving father and mother, with a home, with friends.

He felt Daryl lean against him, close, felt his hot breath on his neck, burying his face and nuzzling the skin under his chin, lips ghosting in the hollow of his throat. It was ambiguous, _wrongwrongwrong_ some might say, but there never has been anything sexual between them. They were too codependent of each other to be healthy; Merle had accepted that a long time ago, and he knew some people looked at them as if they were the Devil—sick, indulging in sin with such a blatant forbidden relationship. They never hid their mutual need to touch. Daryl never cared what people had to say about him, and he never bothered to refrain from touching Merle. A hug, a hand on his arm, a kiss. Nothing stopped him, least of all Merle.

He knew how it looked. Daryl was pushing thirty, still living with his big brother with no girl in sight. Two redneck brothers living to the dirty cliché of sibling incest.

Well, to hell with them all.

But fuck if Daryl wasn't loving mind games.

He felt his lips ghost over his ear and nearly snorted. "C'mon, Mer, give 'em a show," Daryl purred, "t's what they want."

Merle laughed at that. "You're drunk and horny, that's bad." 

Daryl pursed his lips against his jugular and slowly licked along the column of his neck. "Well, ya scared off my lil' play thing," he whispered, tilting his head up and beginning trailing small kisses and nips of the teeth along Merle's jaw.

Merle huffed. "I won't have that lil' fucker touch ya like that."

Daryl hummed low in his throat and continued his ministration, while Merle unconsciously slide his fingers under his brother's shirt and stroked the skin of his hipbone. "So, show 'em who I belong ta," Daryl muttered after a while and pressed his lips to Merle's, tongue immediately invading his mouth. It was long, languorous and just about perfect, like it always was.

Merle had questioned himself the first time something like that happened. He had actually taken off for a few days to get his head straight, and when he came back, his mind had been filled with arguments on why two brothers couldn't kiss like that. Daryl had listened to Merle's words, and when he'd finished, promptly pushed him against in couch and cuddled him until Merle had calmed down.

He'd come to accept that kissing him like that was only a way for Daryl to express what he couldn't tell Merle in words. Daryl rarely had words for the things he felt and often preferred to act physically to convey what he meant. So, kissing Merle wasn't sexual; it was grateful. In his twisted blond head, Daryl thought kissing Merle was the same as saying ' _I love you/Brother/Thank you for raising me/Dad_.' Merle accepted it—and actually, craved it.

Some days— _most days_ —Merle wondered.

Just wondered if he wasn't the craziest Dixon of the two.

0

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please do not hesitate to tell me about typos or missing words :)


	5. Dangling feet from window frame

0

Carol was a loving mother. It was clear when Merle watched her act around Sophia. She was patient and calm. She often kissed and hugged her daughter without reason, and never screamed or hit her. 

Thinking on it, their own mother probably was a vindictive narcissist. At least before Daryl's birth. She'd endeavored to look like the perfect mother, her entire self-image wrapped up around the concept. 

Her constant asking of Merle to say he loved her from the crib reinforced her belief, and later, Daryl's refusal to acknowledge her validated her hatred for him, making her choose ( _prefer_ ) Merle over Daryl, even if Merle wasn't a little boy anymore. It made Daryl a constant disappointment and a blatant mistake from the start as the kid had proved to be much less malleable than Merle. 

_'Why couldn't I be the perfect ma and have the perfect kids like all the other moms?! I deserve that!'_

That's what Merle heard a few hours before the fire.

0

Merle crossed his bare feet at the ankles and took a giant bite into his burger. Their room was on the small size with only a double bed with a sagging mattress sitting in the middle, a bedside table with a disconnected phone, and a TV so outdated they had covered the antenna with aluminum for better reception. 

Daryl was sitting at the foot of the bed, eating his fries with his eyes glued to the Spanish soap opera on the screen. He'd wrapped himself in a fluffy pink bathrobe after he'd showered and Merle watched the droplets of water fall down his damp hair. It was strange to see Daryl's face so clearly. He normally always had hair in his face with his eyes hidden to the world.

He blinked out of his thought when Daryl laughed at something happening on the screen and scowled. "Since when d'ya speak Spanish?"

Daryl tilted his head back and swallowed a handful of fries. "Since always, bro. C'mon, don't tell me ya never caught up with the shit with all 'em spics 'round town…"

Merle stared at him incredulously. "Nah man." He shrugged. "Ain't smart like ya." 

Daryl glared at him. "You're smart, ass'ole!" he hissed with a pointed finger at Merle. "Don't go say 'therwise."

Merle lifted an eyebrow at Daryl's sudden fierceness. His brother had always been touchy about anyone dissing him, even when it was Merle himself.

 _Especially_ when it was Merle, in fact. 

He nodded at Daryl, shaking his head in amusement at his little brother's aggravated face and turned back to the TV.  

He took another bite of his burger. 

He didn't know how to feel about that, or if he should even _feel_ something. 

0

Daryl broke Merle's nose when the kid was twenty-eight.

 _Twenty-eight_ , and good God, was that _man_ the scrawny little punk kid he'd adopted so many years ago? 

He snorted out blood and groaned in annoyance at the flow of red liquid that just won't stop pouring down his mouth and chin. He knew Daryl packed a mean punch, but man, this time he didn't even try to hold back.

Merle narrowed his eyes at his brother across the coffee table and glared. "What—the—hell?" he growled, nearly unable to contain his anger.

Daryl was sitting in the couch facing him, smoking calmly, staring— _staringstaringstaring_ —like always, his face impassible, _staring_ at Merle, _alwaysalwaysalways_ , tirelessly staring.

Merle grimaced as he looked away, grabbing a forgotten t-shirt from the back of the couch and pressed it against his nose, still glaring at his brother sideways.

 

"You lil' shit," he muttered under his breath and turned his head away. He didn't want to face Daryl, didn't want to face what was on the coffee table, didn't want to face the fact he'd waited for Daryl to go out that day, didn't want to face the fact that he'd failed.

Just failed, like he always seemed to.

Now he had a busted nose, a pissed off homicidal baby brother and a syringe full of meth laughing at him on the table between them.

And that fucking voice screaming in his head like a twisted loop ' _protect the baby_ '.

Protect the baby, Merle.

Daryl flicked his cigarette once and pressed the butt of it against his wrist, not even flinching when the skin sizzled and burnt, the smell of charred flesh nearly too much for Merle's stomach. His nerves were frayed, his mind stuck in some limbo of the horror of what he'd nearly done, and Daryl was just too silent.

He swallowed hard around the noose squeezing his throat, tasted bile and missed a breath when Daryl reached for the syringe and started playing with it, his face— _God, his face_ —was an hideous mask of a stranger inhabiting his baby brother.

He gasped in despair when Daryl rolled up his sleeve and forcedly stuck the needle in his arm and just waited. Patiently.

Merle felt his body start to shake in earnest terror, his limbs quaking at the pure horror of the image in front of him, threatening to swallow him and drown him and kill him. Daryl with a needle full of drugs pressed _into_ his arm. His sweet little baby threatening to taint his perfect body with the thing that nearly killed Merle so many years ago. That nearly ate him alive. He knew if Daryl pressed the plunger: he'd die. He just couldn't have that. It was inconceivable. Unacceptable.   

 _Dear God, please, if you exist,_ stop _him._

Then he lifted his head and stared back at his brother. Merle's blue eyes meeting Daryl's blue eyes, and what seemed like miles and miles between them. He'd never been so far from Daryl.

Never in his life.

They were facing each other but they might as well be in different countries.

He opened his mouth but instead of words, a sob tore out of his mouth. It took him several seconds to get to talking. "Don't ya dare, don’t." Dry. Wrecked.

Daryl tilted his head on the side, staring at Merle's right cheek, unflinching hand stony against the needle still planted in his vein.

Merle licked his lips and couldn't help the sobs from taking over. He knew what Daryl wanted. " _Please_ , baby!" he pleaded, " _please_ , I'm so sorry, I—I'm so _sorry_!"

Daryl lifted his chin challengingly in his direction and the shift of his eyes to Merle's was quick and overwhelming. Merle felt his already tattered nerves seize and tremble at the icy stare directed at him. Daryl's eyes were neutral. Not judging, but curious. Awaiting. "I guess I let—I let things get way out of hand," he finally breathed out with a wet sob. "And I just—I just couldn't cope no more."

Daryl sighed and let his head fall against the back of the couch, staring at the ceiling, legs spread in front of him, and the needle still in his vein. "I did that," he said after a long moment of silence.

Merle shrugged and rubbed the back of his neck with one hand, the other one running up and down his face. "Fuck, I dunno," he admitted, "guess that's every parent's lot in life."

Daryl hummed lowly in his throat and turned his head, staring at the clear liquid in the syringe. "If I do that, ya won't have ta worry no more," he murmured in that familiar Georgian drawl smooth and gravely, wondering and distant.

They both knew the dose was too strong for someone of Daryl's build. Merle would have gotten high as a kite. Daryl would go six feet under.   

Merle put a hand on his mouth, hummed pensively and put his chin in the palm of his other arm balanced on his knee. "Ya do that, we meet in Hell real soon," he said matter-of-factly. It wasn't a threat, couldn't be a threat. In Merle's head, the Dixon brothers will always do everything together, dying wasn't so much different. And really, there wasn't any point in a life without Daryl. That wonderful, _lurid_ codependency always sticking to them like glue.

Daryl kept staring at the ceiling and didn't move when Merle stood and gently pried his burning fingers away from the syringe. Merle dropped it and crushed it under his boot before rubbing his thumb against the puncture wound in the crook of Daryl's arm, touching until it didn't bleed anymore and trailing his fingers to his wrist and pressing his fingers into the new cigarette burn among old and faded and fresh and red ones.

Daryl didn't move, didn't twitch, didn't react and Merle sighed, grabbing Daryl by the lapel of his jacket and shirt, switching their position to sit with Daryl on his lap. He wrapped his arms tightly around his baby brother's waist and held him, closing his eyes when he felt Daryl gently start to stroke his arm, and burying his face in his chest.

They'd pull through, like always.

It was life.

It was fact.

0

Taking a bath was a luxury Merle didn't often indulge. He actually didn't really appreciate it, but he could see the point of just relaxing in hot water and just listening to the quiet of the bathroom despite the leaky faucet dripping water.

His gaze shifted to the side when Daryl entered the room and sat on the bathmat, an arm resting on the edge of the tub, the other one trailing the tip of his fingers on the surface of the water.

Merle huffed under his breath and reach a wet hand to run his fingers through Daryl's unruly hair. "Can't believe ya used ta be blond," he said as his fingers found the tuff of ash blond hair on the side of Daryl's head.

Daryl hummed, eyes closed under the gentle ministration. They stayed quiet for a long moment, none of them talking and just appreciating the soothing moment.

"Ya missed the vein," Merle murmured after a moment, breaking the silence.

Daryl shifted his head, cheek resting on his forearm resting on the edge of the tub and stared at the inside of the crook his elbow. The bruise was massive, black and mottled purple around the edge. He hummed and closed his eyes again.

"Ya'd 'ave died if ya press'd the plunger," he drawled.

Daryl didn't move. "Mmm-hmm."

Merle fisted his hand in Daryl's hair and lifted his head until they were face to face. "Look at me," he hissed under his breath.

Daryl pursed his lips but opened his eyes, looked at Merle's cheek.

"Up front, Daryl," he ordered.

It took a while but Daryl's eyes finally shifted to the side to stare back at Merle. "Ya pull that shit 'gain, and I'll beat ya to death, got it?"

Daryl chewed on the inside of his lower lip for a moment, but he finally nodded contritely, all of six years old again, and sorry for breaking a glass. Merle stared hard at him, hating himself for threatening his brother but knowing he didn't have a choice. Not for that. He had never put a hand on Daryl when he was a kid, but now that Daryl was an adult, the balance had shifted. Daryl could take a beating—had taken more than one—not by Merle, but others, and sometimes, things needed to be physically beaten for the message to be understood.

"Ya go by your life thinking you're complete. Then ya meet someone n' ya realize you're only half of somethin'. But ya meet that person 'n ya know it's true. You're only really whole when you're with each other," Merle shook Daryl by the hair. "Ya gotta understand that was how I felt since ya was born."

Daryl tilted his head on the side and nodded slowly, eyes bright with unshed tears. "I jus' love ya, Mer'," he muttered, sniffing and rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand. "I didn' want ya ta leave me 'lone."

Merle sighed and pushed Daryl toward his chest, making the kid lose his balance and fall into the bathtub with him. "I ain't leavin' ya, Dare, you're stuck with me 'till ya die."

Daryl tucked his face in the crook of Merle's neck and nodded, strong muscle arms wrapped around Merle like a lifeline.

His strong, perfect Daryl, all grown-up, but still that small boy begging to be loved.

He didn't think he could love his kid more than that.

0

"You don't look alike."

Merle licked his lips and huffed in annoyance.

He'd heard that from day one. When the overly cheery nurse looked up from her chart at Merle standing in front of the glass of the clinic's nursery, ushered him inside and lead him to the bassinet where his little brother had been sleeping. Daryl had been a few hours old, had barely opened his eyes, and really, he didn't look like anyone yet. Nobody had even lifted an eyebrow when a fifteen year old Merle had walked into the clinic with a newborn baby of only a few hours in his arms. Merle had snorted, because, how the fuck could she know?

Officer Grimes worked his jaw for a moment, hands on his belt and head low. In front of them, the paramedics were rolling a stretcher, the discernable form of a body under a black tap, and loading it into the ambulance. Merle flicked his lighter calmly, watching, and waiting.

Daryl was a few feet away, sitting on the hood of a police car, his own cigarette perched on his lips, Sophia sitting silently between his legs.

Carol was standing on the side, arms around her stomach protectively, alternatively talking to a police officer while a fussy paramedic was tending to a gash on her forehead. She seemed wrecked, face covered in tears, as she talked to the cop, and Merle had to admire her for that. After all, if wasn't every day that you actually killed your husband.

Merle could guess what happened, but he sure as hell wasn't going to say anything. Carol had been plotting to end Ed for a long while now, and it seemed tonight had been the endgame of her plan. She'd probably gotten him drunk, aggravated him, and then let him land a few hit to make her scenario plausible. She was brilliant, and Merle felt proud of her fake tears. Ed had been a bastard, and even if he hadn't put a hand on her for a few years now, he'd still been an asshole in the long haul.

Merle thought about how surreal it all seemed and wondered, once again, if Daryl's insanity wasn't contagious or if people had more darkness in them than he'd thought. It nearly reassured him about his and his brother's life.

He rubbed his forehead. "He took after our ma," he finally said.

No slippery territory there. Because whoever Daryl's daddy was, be it the same as Merle, or someone else (some _thing else, Devil's spawn_ ), he sure as hell didn't make Daryl look anything like his older brother, so he probably took after their ma. 

Grimes was silent. "It's a mess."

Merle snorted in spite of himself. "Nah, Grimes. It's life."

And fact, but he didn't say that out loud.

0

" _We're in the noontime jam and it's another gorgeous day here in Atlanta! Be good to yourself, y'all_." 

Merle snorted at the overly cheery voice on radio and sneered. Their town was so small and secluded they didn't even have a local radio. "We need ta go rustle up some vittles today." He narrowed his eyes when Daryl opened his mouth but snapped it shut when he saw his glare. "No escaping. Unless you wanna eat worms." 

Daryl smirked and Merle grimaced in disgust. "Ya gotta shittin' me!" he exclaimed.

Daryl let out a rare full belly laugh. "C'mon, it don't taste like nothin'. Jus' mud."

Merle shuddered. "I don't—" he paused himself and chuckled in amused exasperation. "I don't wanna know."

The woman on the radio answered for Daryl as he rolled down his window and reached out, his hand hanging in the air, feeling for the warm wind, smooth and calm through his fingers. " _Go out and get some fresh air on a day like today!_ "

0

Basic human social interaction escaped Daryl most of the time. He had his moments where he was charming as a snake, ensnaring people like moths to a _burning, burning_ flame, and cunning like a fox, like every sociopath could, but there were other times where it was pretty obvious that he didn't have the first clue about acting normal. 

And watching his brother standing in the middle of the store alley draped in his poncho, brown hair in disarray, faint traces of engine grease on his cheek and narrowed eyes fixed on the dozens pack of different kind of cereal the store proposed, Merle didn't know if he should laugh or cry, because his little brother shouldn't feel so out of place in a simple grocery store.

He walked to him and bumped Daryl's shop basket with his own. "C'mon hotshot, move your ass," he said under his breath, glaring at the woman trying to stare at them covertly at the end of the alley. She looked like she wanted nothing more than have them thrown out, and her face was pinched like she had just swallowed a particularly bitter lemon.

Daryl scratched his cheek, and with the way his face was angled, with the way the lights and shadows of the harsh light danced and accentuated some of his bone structure and expressions, at that moment, all of that coupled with Daryl's silent body language, it all reminded Merle of their daddy. But be it simply from imitating Merle (who knew had more of his dad's behavior in him than he'd liked), or genes, Merle couldn't tell.

Had never been able to tell.

Daryl grabbed a box of chocolate cereal and placed it in his basket carefully. Merle took the lead and walked to the canned food aisle to stock on peaches.

Neither of the Dixon boys liked chocolate.

0

Merle hadn't seen Will Dixon since he got complete custody of Daryl twenty-three years ago. He knew the man was still alive, but he didn't know anything about his whereabouts. 

He also never saw the length of Daryl's insanity first hand. Bar fights, sure, and while he'd seen the _results_ of his brother's episode, he'd never been witness to one of his psychotic breaks. 

He started wondering where Daryl was taking them when they had been driving for three hours.

Daryl didn't answer, but the small smirk he wore almost all the trip didn't bode well and only served to wreck Merle's nerves. He waited and smoked, the cabin of the truck nearly blurry with white clouds of smoke. 

Daryl finally slowed down and parked in a quiet suburban neighborhood. It didn't scream wealth or high class, but it was miles away from their poor background in hillbilly redneck land lost in the mountains. 

The rows of sleeping houses was enough to make Merle shift uncomfortably. While he regretted never having been able to offer Daryl much growing up, the boy never asked for anything apart from Merle's love. And anyway, looking at those modest, but well-kept houses, Merle couldn't see them liking it here. Daryl would have never stood such a place and gone crazy (—pun intended—) way earlier. 

"What're we doin' 'ere, baby bro?"

Daryl hollowed his cheeks as he took a deep drag on his cigarette, and pointed his chin to the house across the street from where they were parked. "Jus' wait," he murmured.  

So they waited for about an hour until a grey Cadillac pulled up in front of the house. After a few seconds, a woman got out the passenger side. She was rather small, non-descript, plain looking and had to be around Merle's age with longish brown hair, a pair of jeans and a pink shirt. 

Merle watched her open the back door and a girl who couldn't be more than ten years old jumped out with a giggle. Then the driver's door opened and he breathed in harshly. "Well, I'll be damned," he muttered. Daryl snorted as Merle rubbed his mouth. "So, he's got a new family now," he muttered. "How'd'ya even know?" 

Daryl eyed him sideways. "Never lost track of 'im." 

Merle shook his head. "C'mon, lil' D, ya was only six last time ya saw 'im." 

Daryl giggled like a lunatic, psycho little shit that he was. "Oh, Merle," was all he said with a dramatic shake of his head, and damn if he didn't sound _sorry_ for Merle. 

The older Dixon turned his head away and watched his father's new family walk to the house, talking and laughing together. Seemingly happy, like they had never been.  

Merle found it offensive to witness. Will Dixon the asshole, _never_ laughed _with_ Merle or Daryl—oh no, he preferred to laugh _at_ them after humiliating them and making them beg for mercy with his fists and belt.

It was a shock. He couldn't deny it, and he knew it was the reaction Daryl had gone for.

His brother didn't normally play his head games on him, but it had happened randomly during their lives. Merle had some unsavory facets to his personality and had been a jerk to Daryl more than once, but in the end there wasn't a thing more important to the both of them than each other. 

Will Dixon proved it just now. They didn't need him. Never did in fact. Merle had been more than enough from day one, stepping in and taking Daryl as his own. 

Why Daryl was showing him this today wasn't to make him suffer. It was his little brother's twisted way to show him how much he loved him and appreciated all he'd done for him. His brother who was his father.  

"So, what do we do now?" 

Daryl shrugged. "What'ver ya want. We can go say 'ello." 

Merle rubbed his face. "Daryl…" he trailed off warningly. 

Daryl only chuckled and sat sideways on the truck's old cracked leather seat, draping his arm on the back of the bench. "Jus' ta say 'ello, Mer'." 

Merle snorted and looked at the house. "You're askin' for trouble." Because he very much doubted Daryl wanted to _just_ say hello.  

Daryl leaned toward him and rubbed his face against Merle's shoulder. Like some damn fat cat. "Where's your sense of adventure, bro?" 

Merle had to laugh at that. "Well, let's hit the bars t'night," he said. "We'll see 'bout the ol' man tomorrow, yeah?"

Daryl whooped and laughed, drumming his hands on the driving wheel. "Now that's what I'm talkin' 'bout," he muttered, his drooping cigarette at the corner of his mouth threatening to fall. 

0

The day after, they parked in the same spot and Merle killed the ignition.

He sighed and turned to Daryl expectedly. The boy was thrumming in his seat, nimble fingers drumming against is thighs. He itched for something. Merle knew his baby brother by heart, and he could see the familiar glint in his blue eyes.

He could nearly _see_ Daryl's blood shimmer under his skin. 

They crossed the street in silence and Merle followed as Daryl jumped on the front step, cigarette already dangling from his mouth, and watched him knock in a flourish and step back, hands in his pockets, rocking on his heels as they waited. 

It wasn't long enough for Merle to steady his raging thoughts, and before he could change his mind and drag Daryl away from this catastrophe, the door opened and the brown-haired woman smiled hesitantly at them. 

"Hello there," she said.

Merle could see her eyes travel from Daryl to him and back to Daryl warily. "May I help you?"

She was so different from their mother. So…normal. She didn't seem scared, or weak. She didn't seem to be afraid of her own shadow. She seemed happy and secure in her life, with her house, her garden, her daughter, and her husband. She seemed loved. It was a bitter pill to swallow.

Daryl stepped in front of Merle and nodded slightly, acting shy and sweet. "We're friends of Will's."

She smiled brightly. "Oh! I'm sorry, he isn't there. He's been called to the office, but…" she stopped and looked over her shoulder. "Maybe you could come in, wait for him?"

Daryl clapped his hands. "Perfect," he purred with a smirk. Merle felt his gut clench and followed mutely.

She led them to the living room and waved at the couch. "Please, sit."

Merle sat with a nod of thanks while Daryl walked around the room, staring and touching everything, nodding once when she asked if they wanted something to drink. She left them to go to the kitchen and Merle sighed, rubbing his face. "Why do I always fall for your shitty plans?" he mumbled. "I shouldn't encourage ya…"

Daryl snorted a laugh and grabbed a picture sitting on the mantle of the fireplace. "Oh, look'it," he drawled, "such a sweet family…"

Merle looked up at the dark tone in Daryl's voice and wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans. "Daryl."

The boy turned to stare at him, tilting his head right and left like a damn bird and pointed his chin challengingly at Merle before shrugging, whole body jerking at the gesture. He was barely holding on, ready to snap and Merle knew it. "What're we gonna tell 'em?" he asked instead.

Daryl hummed, fingers itching for a cigarette, but didn't have time to answer before the woman came back and gave them their drinks. Merle barely tasted the lemonade before gulping down half the glass.

"What did you say your names were?" she asked politely, her smile still firmly in place.

She was talking to Merle and seemingly avoiding looking in Daryl's vicinity. Some people did that. They seemed to unconsciously sense _something_ and just avoided him like scared animals.

Merle cleared his throat. "What's yours?" he asked instead, trying to steer the conversation away from them. He didn't know if Will had talked of them to that woman. She didn't seem to recognize them, but they couldn't be sure. "We didn't know Will was married."

She grinned. "My name's Alexandra," she answered promptly. "People call me Lexie."

Merle froze, knuckles white on his glass.

" _Lexie Dixon_?" Daryl suddenly asked, voice low and ragged.

The woman's smile shivered slightly on her lips, but she turned to Daryl with a nod. "Yes," she confirmed.

Merle put his glass down on the coffee table, next to Daryl's untouched one and stood suddenly. "C'mon, we need ta go," he said to his brother.

Daryl was still staring at Lexie with a smirk, lips twisted up. "Oh no," he whispered, shaking his head. "No, no, no, no. _We_ need ta stay."

Merle rubbed his mouth and was stepping toward his brother when the front door opened and Will Dixon entered the living room. He stood frozen in the threshold, before his face contortioned in anger and _fear_. "What the hell are ya doin' here?" he hissed as he flung his briefcase on the side. He turned to the woman and glared at her. "Why did ya let 'em in?!" he yelled.

She blinked in total confusion, looking at them all, eyes brimming with tears at her husband's sudden and unexpected outburst. "They-they said they w-were your friends," she stammered.

Will Dixon was a large man, and when he stepped closer to her, she shrunk in on herself by instinct. "Well, they ain't, ya dumb bitch!"

Merle watched the scene unfold, feeling a rather sick feeling in the pit of his stomach and stepped instinctively closer to Daryl, some fossil residue _to protect the baby_ from their father's ire taking over his mind.

Daryl shifted next to him, watching intensely, his smirk still firmly planted on his lips. He was enjoying himself, Merle knew; he was taking pleasure in making their father lose it and terrify the woman.

Will suddenly turned to them, and Merle could never forget that gaze. Those brown eyes so cold and unloving they could freeze you from the inside. "What do ya want?" he spat.

Daryl rocked on his heels and chuckled, stepping away from behind Merle's back. "'ello Daddy," he greeted slowly and continued to walk around the living room. "We was jus' in the neighb'rhood."

Will pressed his lips together and fisted his hands, turning his virulent glare on Merle. "What the hell are ya doin' 'ere?" he snapped, accent getting thicker as if was fueled by his anger. "Ya got what ya wanted twenty years ago!"

Daryl hummed and leaned against the window in the back of the room, looking outside. "It was _twenty-three_ years ago, ya moron," he said and straightened up to stare at Lexie. "Gotta say, never thought there'd ever be a breathin' _Lexie Dixon_ 'gain," he laughed and looked at Will sideways. "Should we call her Mama too?"

Will's face turned beat red. "Get out!" he ordered in a booming voice. "Get out of my house!"

Merle didn't move or say anything, but turned when he heard Daryl coo behind him. He froze for a moment, breath stuck in his throat when Daryl took a step closer to them, a little girl in his arms. "Isn't she a cutie, Mer'?" he asked in glee.

Will took a step closer, his face suddenly pale and Lexie sobbing in her hands behind him, not understanding what was happening. "Put her down!" he ordered, and there was too much white in his eyes.

Daryl chuckled and pinched the girl's side making her sob. "Why?" Daryl asked. "Can't I say 'ello ta my baby sista?" he asked mockingly.            

Will growled and took a step closer to Daryl, but something seemed to stop him dead in his track. Merle felt the heavy atmosphere thicken, something dark and so, so, so bad rising around the room. The sun outside suddenly disappeared, dark clouds, fat with rain congregating, plunging the living room in semi-darkness.

He felt his own panic rise when Daryl continued to hold the girl in his arms. "I like 'er, Daddy," he said in a low voice. "Maybe I'll keep 'er. Ta play."

Lexie screamed, hands held in supplication for her daughter, while Will's whole body was jerking with uncontrollable tremors. "Let her go," he begged, falling to his knees.

Merle stepped closer to Daryl and caught Daryl's wandering gaze. "C'mon, Daryl," he soothed in a rough voice. "She's jus' a lil' girl, uh? Just like Sophia?"

They were fucked. Why didn't he turn them around as soon as he knew where they were? Daryl was getting out of control, and they weren't somewhere they could easily hide any crime. They weren’t in a shoddy druggie apartment, or surrounded by woods where it was easy to hide a corpse.

He looked pleadingly at his brother, but he didn't know if he should feel relieved to see Daryl relent and put the little girl down. She ran to her mother, heaving sobs rocking her whole body while her mother soothed her as best as she could, taking her in her arms and disappearing down the hall.

Daryl stepped closer to their father and stared down at him. "Now, ain't ya a sight, kneelin' 'n'fonta me?" he drawled.

Will glared up at Daryl, but his brother was quick to press his hands on the side of the man's face with all his might. Will screamed at the pain of those vise-like hands, and Merle knew he didn't imagine the cracking of bones in the jaw. The man grunted and whimpered in pain as Daryl leaned over and started whispering something in his ear. It took a long time, Will starting to sob after several minutes, pleading and begging Daryl who ignored him and kept _whisperingwhisperingwhispering_.

It was so wrong, on so many levels, that Merle just wanted to take Daryl and drive back home.

After a long moment, Daryl stepped back and smiled almost gently at the man sprawled on the plush carpet. Will was sobbing and rocking back and forth, fingers clawing the side of his face. "I'm so sorry!" he begged. "I'm sorry, please forgive me!"

Merle felt sick and had to stumble away from the man. He felt Daryl move next to him and unconsciously grabbed his little brother's hand.

"I l-l-love you, my sons!" Will continued, pleading and begging, and pathetic and so petrifying, "You're my sons! I love you! Please!" 

Daryl hummed and started walking away, dragging Merle with him. "Don't use words ya don't und'rstand, _Daddy_ ," he murmured.

He slammed the door behind them and Merle let himself be pushed into the truck, eyes still glued to the house in disbelief and uneasiness and that agonizing feeling of _wrongwrongwrong_.

Daryl started the truck and drove down the streets, waving at the house lazily.

Halfway back home, Merle asked Daryl to stop the truck and hurriedly got out, losing his breakfast, lunch and that stupid lemonade violently on the gravel under his boots.

Daryl leaned over the opened window, resting his head on his crossed arms, observing Merle silently as he wiped his mouth and grunted, body weak with being so sick so abruptly. "What did ya do, Daryl?" he rasped and turned to glare at his brother. "What did ya do?!"

Daryl looked confused, then sheepish, then satisfied, then impassive. So impassive. So, so, so blank Merle wondered if Daryl didn't just check out. That stupid little control freak dared to disappear on him in the moments when Merle had to deal with it all. Had to deal with the craziness, the fear of being found out, of losing his little brother to those voices in his head. He felt his anger build and build and he slammed his fist into the side of the truck, denting it. "What the hell did ya do, Daryl?" he yelled and crashed to his knees.

He felt numb; he felt cold; he felt sick.

Daryl slide out the car and sat behind Merle, draping himself over his back, linking his arms around Merle's neck. "I jus' let 'em talk," he answered Merle.

Merle laughed jadedly, brittle and weak, so, so tired. "Them voices, ya mean," he breathed out. 

Daryl nodded against his back. "They were so loud in the house," he whispered, "they were so painful ta hear."

Merle grabbed one of Daryl's forearm and pressed it against his chest, squeezing it gently. "Were they sayin' ta kill 'em?"

Daryl nodded with a hum. "I wish I could make ya happy, Mer', I wish I was normal."

Merle sobbed out a laugh and turned to wrap his arms around his little brother, leaning against the car and holding Daryl on his lap like he was a small boy again. "You're perfect the way ya are," he muttered, burying his face in Daryl's hair.  

Daryl shuddered against him. "I don't want ya ta end up hating me Mer'," he whispered hoarsely.

"I could never hate ya, baby," he swore fervently, gripping his hand, afraid that if he let go, Daryl would just disappear.

He lived every single day with the weight of knowing that he'd never be able to stop his brother and above all, didn't want to.

0

Normal was never their lives.

Merle dreamt of normal before Daryl was born. At first, his father hadn't been violent and abusive. He wished Daryl had known the feeling. He knew he'd provided that for Daryl, but there was still that slight twinge inside Merle that regretted his little brother had never felt the love of his real father. 

Two months after Daryl unexpectedly dropped out of high school, Merle found an acceptance letter for a full paid scholarship at the University of Georgia. He wasn't being sneaky, he was just putting away clean laundry in Daryl's dresser when he found the letter hidden between a black tee and a red shirt. Merle remembered staggering to the bed, sitting heavily on the unmade quilt, letter clenched in his white knuckled fingers.

It was like a ton of bricks had suddenly been dropped on his head, because he was holding his little brother's one shot at that _normal_ life he'd always wished for him, because as times passed, the guilt of holding Daryl back was starting to become something concrete and painful.

He didn't hear Daryl enter the room, but he felt the bed dip next to him and deft fingers grab the letter out of his slack hands. He blinked out of his shock when he heard the sound of a Zippo and stared, enthralled, as the simple white piece of sheet—that held so much power—caught fire and burnt to a crisp.

Fire was their normal, Merle often reminded himself.

Fire, heat, blood…that was their life.

Officers Rick Grimes and Shane Walsh didn't know that when they knocked one morning.

Merle opened the door with a bad feeling in the pit of his guts. They looked young, a few years older than Daryl, but younger than Merle, and they had those cocky mannerisms of being the ones holding the guns legally. Especially Walsh, who was bad seed. 

Merle led them to the kitchen, waved at the chairs, and started making coffee to keep his hands busy and avoid getting arrested for knocking their smug little patronizing gaze as they looked around and took in their surroundings. His house might be sparse, but it was quaint, and it was home. And at least, he wasn't the one wearing the stupid hat.

He gave them a mug each and leaned against the counter with his own resting untouched at his elbow.

And waited.

"Thank you, Mr. Dixon," Grimes acknowledged, taking a polite sip.

Merle observed him, from the day he met him in the bar after Daryl got stabbed, he'd immediately pegged him as the Alpha, even if Walsh wanted to look intimidating and in command. 

Walsh was the brute type, easy to discard. Grimes was smart though, and kept his cards pretty close to his chest. He was the one that could stir trouble.

"As much as I like havin' a good chat with ya cops, I know ya ain't 'ere for my coffee," he drawled after a moment.

He knew they wanted him to be the first to ask, but he didn't feel like giving them that much. Some days, Merle thought _everything_ had to be a fight, and losing it meant losing Daryl. And that, that was just not acceptable.

It was all mind games now, but what they ignored was that Merle had been playing those games since Daryl was born, and his little brother was the king. Grimes and Walsh had nothing against the sweltering devil disguised as his little brother.

Grimes' smile was feeble and uneasy, but the other one looked up at Merle with barely concealed glee in his dark eyes. He was enjoying having to deliver what he assumed was some bad news, not knowing Merle already knew perfectly well where this conversation was going.

"Yesterday morning, there was a triple homicide in a little town about two hundred miles from here."

Merle stared at him. "Aw'right," he drawled, playing cool but reeling at the news.

Grimes took back the lead of the conversation and scratched his cheek uncomfortably. Merle could tell it wasn't long since they'd been doing this job, and announcing deaths was still a strange affair for them. "Yesterday morning," he said again, "the police found the bodies of Alexandra Dixon, Selena Dixon, and Will Dixon at their residence. All had been shot down with a hunting rifle. It looked like Will Dixon shot his wife first, then his daughter and then killed himself with the same weapon."

Merle bit his lower lip and rubbed his forehead, sighing angrily. "Goddamn it," he growled.

He saw Grimes and Walsh exchange a stare between them, but Merle couldn't care less. The only thing crossing his mind was ' _thank god, Daryl's got an ironclad alibi for yesterday morning_ '.

"Mr. Dixon, how long has it been since you last saw your father?" Walsh continued questioning.

"Uh, twenty-three years. When I got custody 'f my baby brother," he answered absently with a wave of his hand, wandering mind miles away from the conversation. "Ass'ole liked to beat me 'n Daryl black 'n blue."

They exchanged another stare between them, and Merle felt he had to ask. "Did he, uh—did he hurt the girl? _Before_ I mean." He couldn't bring himself to say the word _sister_ . Even if she was his half-sister in theory, it was inconceivable in his head. Daryl was the only one. Daryl was _his_. His little brother, his son, his baby…there wasn't any place in his heart for someone else, especially a dead girl. 

Grimes grimaced. "Preliminary results don't show any sign of abuse, no."

Merle snorted. Go figure. "Yeah, well, I dunno what ya want me to say. We put that shit behind us a long time ago…" It was a lie really, Merle didn't know a day their lives weren't tainted by Will Dixon's hovering ghost. "I'm jus' sorry he hurt them girls…"

The cops nodded at his words, and Merle felt things shift in his favor. He wasn't the kind of man to invoke pity, and people didn't generally feel sorry for him, but whatever worked to make them leave. Sometimes, he wondered why he didn't get a medal for all the crap he put up with.

"We would like to talk to your younger brother," Grimes said after a while, scribbling in his notebook.

Merle shrugged. "Daryl's out in the woods." And he should damn well stay there for a while before Merle got his hands on the little bastard. It was twice already that Daryl's crazy had brought the cops to their house.

He grimaced internally when the front door got kicked open noisily and Daryl's normally feather light gait thumped toward them. The kid took in the scene with narrowed eyes, dead rabbits held loosely in one hand and crossbow strapped on his back. Merle cleared his throat. "Somethin' happened."

Daryl stared at Merle's chin for a moment before dropping the rabbits on the table in front of the cops, probably purposely, if Walsh's disgusted face was any indication. He unstrapped his crossbow from his back and passed it to Merle as he zipped down his snow covered coat.

That morning, Daryl had uncharacteristically decided to go hunting even if it was snowing. Merle hadn't thought much of this behavior until he saw the cops' car pull up. He'd stopped wondering a long time ago if it was Daryl's sixth sense and great intuition or his remarkable knowledge of the law that allowed him to anticipate the cops' behavior.

He put the crossbow on the hook near the kitchen backdoor and crossed his arms as Daryl put his coat on the back of a chair and leaned against the counter next to him. "They're 'ere 'cause the ol' man offed himself yesterday," he said after a while when it became clear they were waiting for him to speak to his brother. Pussies.

Daryl, being such a consummate actor and true to himself, scrunched his face in vague regret and faint sadness. Maybe he was the one deserving a medal after all. Merle didn't know how hard it had to be for someone like him to feign emotions. He tried to teach him some along the years, but it normally ended in frustrated huffs and angry words. Daryl couldn't care less for emotions. But he always upped his act in those situations. He was reliable like that, and Merle wasn't lost on the irony. If only they knew.

"Really?" Daryl muttered as he brought his thumb to his mouth and started to chew in a clear sign of anxiety. Even Merle didn't know if it as an act this time. Good boy.

"Yeah," Merle confirmed. "Got his new wife and kid too."

Daryl made a small noise at the back of his throat, and Merle felt a shiver run down his spine because where the cops heard a sound of distress, Merle heard a sound of pleasure.

"We're sorry," Grimes finally said, eyes trained on Daryl's face hidden behind his fringe. He was angling his head to catch Daryl's eyes, but the kid was staring at the floor.

Merle shrugged and looked away with a grimace. He wasn't really sorry himself. He'd known it would happen the moment he realized they were parked in front of the man's house. His only regret was the little girl. She didn't deserve to be shot down by her daddy, but at least Daryl had kept his promise from all those years ago. He'd never actively killed a kid.

Small comfort he guessed, but it was in those moments that he wondered if Daryl's insanity wasn't just bleeding into him or hadn't always been there. Maybe he'd never been right in the head either if he was trying to justify his little brother's killing spree in his mind.

Maybe it was to reassure himself, but maybe it was something else.

He wasn't sad for their old man's death, wasn't for that Lexie woman either. Hadn't really been for their mom or the old witch in her pink house. Wasn't neither for the dumb bimbo from the garage, or Jake in Atlanta, or the man who stabbed Daryl…

He ought to be uneasy, but the circumstances of those deaths were more disturbing than their deaths in themselves. Beheading, disemboweling, burning, crucifying, raping…those were sick.

But the result was all the same.

Shit happened. People died, it was life…it was fact.

"We wanted to know if you had any contact with your—with Will Dixon recently."

Merle nearly bristled at the question, but turned and looked away, eyes fixed on the crossbow dangling from the wall and wondering if he would have time to reload between killing both cops. Nah, those guys looked too trigger happy to make the risk worth it—and worse, Daryl risked to get caught in the crossfire.

Daryl shook his head and continued to gnaw on his thumb. Merle played his part and elbowed him in the side gently. "Nah, not since—Merle got me. I was six."

The cops nodded simultaneously. "Did you know about his…new family?"

Daryl shook his head and leaned a bit toward Merle. Whatever screwed connections were defective in his head, Daryl could still feel the pain of all those years of beating and abuse, because before becoming so tolerant to pain, Daryl had been a tiny, vulnerable little boy.

Merle didn't know how long it'd been since Daryl discovered their father had remarried with a woman with the same name as their mother, but he knew it hadn't left his little brother unscratched, especially when learning the little girl had never been touched by their daddy.

"No," Merle finally answered vocally, echoing the shake of Daryl's head. "No, we didn't know. Like I said, we ain't seen the man in a long time."

The cops nodded, Grimes scribbled something else on his notebook before they stood and nodded at them. "Thank you for your time," Grimes smiled almost gently, and Merle never wanted to hit him more than in that moment.

Merle stood at the window watching the car speed up down the dusty road and rocked slightly on his heels wondering, once more, what Daryl had really done. And how.

0

That evening, he stepped outside and observed Daryl on the rocking chair for a moment. "They comin' back? Need to drive us to Mexico?" he finally asked.

Daryl giggled. Downright _giggled_ at him. "Nope."

Merle's eyebrow ticked. "How d'ya figure that?" he couldn't help but snap.

Daryl puffed a cloud of smoke above his head, and Merle wondered if it was always going to be their lives: work at the garage, hunt their meals, hide Daryl's darkness, and smoke sitting on the porch in winter (spring, summer, autumn).

Daryl turned his head slowly and stared at Merle. "'Cause they were more int'rest'd in comin' see what the deal was with them Dixon brothers leavin' in them woods 'lone than anythin' else," he explained calmly as if talking to a particularly dim child. "That Walsh guy was dyin' to 'xplore the house for drugs, 'n Grimes was damn happy our ol' man was dead."

Merle glared at his boots and stretched his legs on the porch steps. "Ya sure?"

Daryl heaved himself from the rocking chair and sat next to Merle on the steps. "C'mon, what's this? Ya went to jail 'cause ya wouldn't rat on your ass'ole dealer 'n now ya go all pussy on me? That's not ya, Mer'." He blew a ring of smoke.

Merle shrugged and took another cigarette from his half empty pack. He grabbed Daryl's lighter and took a deep breath. "If ya get caught, baby brother, you're finished, 't's death row for ya, d'ya get that?"

Daryl raked his fingers through his hair as he nodded, slightly rocking back and forth. "'Course I get it," he muttered petulantly. "But 't's ya that don't get it, Merle," at his raised eyebrow Daryl decided to be more accurate, "them cops won't ever be the ones."

'The ones' had always meant ' _the ones able to stop me_ ' in Daryl-language. Merle wasn't the one, and apparently, those two officers weren't either. He scoffed. "C'mon, what the hell, Daryl? How can ya even know that?"

Daryl shrugged. "That Walsh guy is easy to figure. He's a thug. He likes power, but he's weak. And that Grimes guy, he's got som'thin' dark in him."

Merle looked at him incredulously. "What's your point?"

Daryl smiled at him. "My point is they won't bother us. Ever."

"I wish I had your faith, lil' D," he sighed and blew smoke through his nose.

Daryl snuggled against him until Merle wrapped his arms around him, and they both watched the dark forest surrounding them in silence.

It was calm and relaxing.           

Merle wished it could always be like that.

0

Merle woke in the middle of the night with his left arm prickling with thousands of tiny shards, remembering the weight of Daryl's head when he fell asleep a few hours ago. The skin of his wrist and hand felt dry, while the top of his arm was drenched in sweat.

He blinked owlishly at the ceiling, listening to the incessant song of the crickets and other nocturnal critters, trying to understand what woke him. It often happened, Merle had always been a light sleeper, while Daryl rarely slept or slept like the dead.

It took him several seconds to realize he was alone in bed, the side where Daryl slept still warm but barely. He fisted his hand, trying to get the circulation back in his limb and sat with a yawn, not really worried about his wandering brother.

He stood and walked down the stair slowly, rubbing his eyes and blinking at the clock above the fridge. 3:08 am. Uh. Way too early, even by Dixon standard. They were early risers, but not _that_ early. If he hadn’t gone to bed with Daryl next to him the night before, he would have said his brother hadn’t slept at all.

He walked to the coffee machine and turned it on, glancing quickly into the living room, and seeing his brother wasn't there, decided to walk to the back door in the kitchen.

Daryl was sitting bare chest on the steps of the porch with a knife sharpener in hand, and what was probably every knife they owned surrounding him. He was in the middle of sharpening a large Bowie hunting one when he looked up sharply and stared in Merle's direction, nodding curtly in greeting. Merle hummed at him, walked back to the kitchen to serve two large mugs of coffee and went back out, sitting heavily on the steps next to his brother.

 

He sipped his coffee in silence, lulled by the sound of the knife sharpener and Daryl's steady breathing, before he felt his brother shift closer to grab his mug, bumping his forehead with him in silent greeting and thanks.

"Ya slept at all?" he asked after a while, running his fingers tenderly through Daryl's too long sweat drenched hair, and down his head to the big scar on his forehead.

Daryl shrugged. "Bit," he grunted.

Merle narrowed his eyes sideways at him. "Nightmare?"

He felt Daryl bristle at the question and knew it bothered him a lot to suffer from them. It had always baffled Merle that his brother had nightmares on a daily basis despite the horrors he enjoyed committing. But then again, doing those things for pleasure and enduring them by the hand of their father were two very different things.

He wished he'd had the guts to kill their father and show his corpse to his brother instead of just taking Daryl away.

0

Grimes didn't fake as well as Carol, but he was pretty convincing. And people around seemed to buy his act.

After all, King County Sheriff's Deputy Rick Grimes was well-liked by people for his patience and understanding. He always had a kind word and a friendly gaze to the people he addressed, and endeavored to protect the weakest. He was also known as a loving father and good husband, so the news of learning his two children had been killed in an accident generated a shock-wave in the surrounding towns.

Merle didn't really know why he dragged Daryl to King County to attend the burial. Maybe it was some kind of morbid fascination, he didn't know, but he wanted to _see_. Daryl was sitting on a headstone next to him, smoking and staring, while Merle just watched the whole thing with mild interest.

Grimes was good—really, really good. Nearly as good as Daryl, and he sat hunched on himself in the front row of seat next to his sobbing wife. The woman seemed inconsolable, on the verge of a breakdown, but Merle saw the strange glint in the man's eyes when their stare met a few seconds.

He now understood what Grimes meant when he said he hated having people take away his things.

The depth of the man's evil could rival Daryl's, because this was a man that didn't back down from murdering his own children just to get back at his cheating wife.

It would be hilarious if it wasn't so…horrifying.

And Merle felt Daryl's body next to him pulse in _want_. Need. It burned brighter than the sun, excruciating heat emanating from him in waves, in every direction surrounding him like a twisted halo, like the illusion of gasoline on burning roads in hot summer, the blaze was thick like Daryl's madness, layer after layer after layer of running lava, prickling his skin just standing next to it, searing all the way down to his aching lungs.  

And God, of all the men on earth, his little brother couldn't have chosen worse.

Or better.

0

Merle pulled home a little bit after six in the afternoon, and glanced at the unknown car parked next to Daryl's bike. He killed the ignition and got out of his truck, stopping a few feet from the porch to observe his brother in the rocking chair.

He was only wearing a pair of running shorts and unlaced boots. Smoke dangling brazenly from his mouth and hair in disarray. Merle didn't need Daryl's IQ to guess what the kid had been doing the last four days in his absence.

He pursed his lips and walked into the house slowly, went to the kitchen and helped himself a mug of fresh coffee. He sat at the table and met Grimes' stare head on.

The man observed him for a moment before sheepishly rubbing the back of his head. For a moment, Merle had trouble reconciling the cold child murderer with this bashful guy that just fucked his little brother.

"Uhm, hi." He grinned.

Merle sipped his coffee and put it down on the table with a sigh, rubbing his forehead. "How's it gonna work, uh?" he just asked curtly. "Ya fuck my lil' brother n' go back to your wife, Officer?"

Grimes grimaced slightly before twisting his upper lip in a barely contained smile. "She's, uh, been interned for a, a breakdown."

Merle lifted an eyebrow. "And 'nstead of bein' with her, you're fucking a redneck in the woods."

He snorted and shook his head, curly hair bouncing with the movement. "No, she's with Walsh. Said she didn't have anything to lose now, so she's out with him."

It didn't really serve to convince Merle. "What'd'ya want with Daryl?"

Grimes' smile turned saucy this time. "Well, you can guess," his eyes widened when he met Merle's glare and quickly turned serious. "He's—he's perfect."

The way he said it, Merle couldn't help but feel some of that ice run down his spine. It sounded like Daryl when he found a new obsession, and Merle didn't know if Daryl being the center of Grimes' fixation was a good thing. Daryl's tended to end in blood and bones. One thing was for sure though, he'd kill Grimes before he touched Daryl in any way that could hurt him.   

Daryl came back from outside and sat himself on Merle's laps, an arm around his neck. "Can I keep him?" he murmured against the side of his face. "He's pretty."

Merle unconsciously wrapped an arm around Daryl's waist and stared at Grimes above his brother's head. "He stays here with me," he said in a voice that brook no argument. "He's mine, and that's non-negotiable." It felt like talking about a mere possession, but he didn't fucking care. He felt Daryl's arms tightened in reassurance around his neck and felt the truth in his brother's arms.

Grimes would never stand between them. _Ever_.

The man observed them and met Merle's eyes calmly. There was no challenge in his blue gaze, just acceptance and understanding. He seemed to get, on some level, the dependence of one brother for the other. "I understand. I won't take him away from you."

Merle sighed and rubbed his cheek against the top of Daryl's head.

He didn't know how parents accepted to let go of their kids so easily.

One thing was for sure though, Daryl would never leave.

0

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please do not hesitate to tell me about typos or missing words :)
> 
> My beta pointed out that Will Dixon's new-found good behavior was not believable. I don't agree, alcohol makes people do very bad things, and I know first hand because I experienced it with someone in my family on a daily basis.


	6. Will they ever ever reach the floor?

0

Merle hadn't been expecting grand romance and candlelight dinner, but Daryl and Grimes being together wasn't so different from before.

The man spent some of his time in their house, but his brother never went to Grimes'. Daryl still slept with Merle most nights, and the cop didn't seem fazed by it, which, really, was pretty strange, because Merle didn't know many men who would accept their partner to have a relationship with their brother that looked more romantic than platonic.

Some of his things slowly gravitated into their house, and the three of them had established some sort of routine and quietly each made their own lives, and Grimes turned out to be not as irritating as Merle thought, even for a cop.

Daryl was still his quiet self, didn't even talk much to Grimes, but Merle never saw any sign of frustration or anger coming from the man. He seemed peaceful and at ease, often joining Daryl on the porch to wrap his little brother in his arms and just watch the woods in silence.

Merle guessed it was a logical evolution. He felt better knowing Daryl wouldn't be alone if anything happened to him. He'd always feared not being able to be there for Daryl, but now he knew Grimes was what his brother needed, and would take care of Daryl. It was an unspoken law between them; it had been established from the first days of this little tryst. Merle had made it pretty clear that if Grimes became part of the family, then it was a life-long contract. The man had taken on the challenge head first and not disappointed since then.

It was life. It was fact.

It felt…good.

0

Merle didn't move when he heard Grimes' heavy gait behind him, and simply continued smoking and staring at the calm stream. The man was a decent cop but a shitty hunter, and after one too many scared game, Daryl had literally banned the man from tagging along on his hunts.

"Hey," Grimes said, sitting next to him.

Merle hummed his own greeting and waved his pack of smoke to the man who refused with a slow shake of the hand. "No thanks," he murmured.

Merle's eyebrow tilted but he replaced the pack in his breast pocket silently. "So, did ya ditch the lil' man?" he asked after a moment.

Rick chuckled. "No," he answered, "he went hunting…somewhere."

Something— _somebody_ —more like. Daryl had been itchy and crawling all over the place for a while now, and Merle knew the signs. He didn't expect Daryl to come back for a few days, but expected to read about strange disappearances in the near future in the papers.

They stayed silent for a moment before Grimes shifted next to him to position himself facing Merle's side. "So…is it schizophrenia, or something?"

Merle pursed his lips and inhaled nervously on his cigarette. "I dunno what you're talkin' about," he muttered, looking away.

Grimes leaned closer. "Daryl," he pressed. "Is he sick?"

Merle turned harshly to face the man and glared. "Daryl is _perfect_ ," he growled, unconsciously echoing the words the man had used all those months ago when Merle discovered their relationship.

Grimes looked frustrated. "Of course he's perfect. I _know_ that," he snapped, "but is he sick?"

Merle stared. Stared as hard as Daryl stared. Stared until he felt like his eyes were burning Grimes' soul and igniting it in flame. He wished to avoid this conversation. He wished Daryl had never taken an interest in Grimes. He wished Grimes himself didn't love Daryl so much. He wished—

"Listen, Merle," Rick started slowly, reassuringly, "I know you're scared."

Merle tried to reign in any brewing frustration as the man dared to assume he knew anything about him. He stood and glared down at the cop. "Don't pretend ya know anythin' 'bout me 'n Daryl," he spat, and watched the man stand to face him. "I fuckin' raised him! I protected him, I nurtured him! He's _mine_ . And I'll be damned if I let anyone, _anyone_ hurt him or take him away from me _again_!" 

Grimes smiled gently, hands held in peace. "I love him, Merle. I love him with my soul. He's mine too, and I won't let anything bad happen to him. But I need to know to protect him."

Merle watched him in distrust but saw the truth in Grimes' eyes. Such devotion was hard to achieve, Merle knew. He could see the same one every morning in the mirror reflecting in his own eyes. Devotion, love, protectiveness, possessiveness. _Staringstaringstaring_ and burning with its force.

He cleared his throat and looked down before levelling Grimes with a flat stare. "I always had only one rule," he said more calmly, "n' Daryl always followed it." He blinked, blinked and rubbed his mouth, hesitating, not hesitating, and looked at the sky. Grey. So bare and devoid of color. Like Daryl's vision. "No kid. Ever."

Grimes stared back, and narrowed his eyes as he looked at the ground. "Alright," he agreed, hands lifting to rest on his belt, Colt dangling against at his hip. "Yeah, I guess I can do that. Anyway—it was a one timer." He shrugged self-consciously. "Don't have any more kids around." He paused, looking thoughtful. "Or not that I know of." He looked up and smiled at Merle. "I understand your rule. It's smart."

Merle gritted his teeth and racked his slightly trembling fingers over his head. "I guess Daryl weren't wrong 'bout ya," he muttered, and patted himself for another smoke. "Good God, he couldn't be more right 'bout picking ya."

Grimes chuckled, and Merle shook his head at the absurd and grotesque situation. "He's—just a little crazy…sometimes," he finally admitted. "Things build up in him 'till he can't stand it n' jus'…explode."

Grimes hummed and sat back down next to Merle. "I'll need to know more to cover his tracks if something happens."

Merle closed his eyes. He'd never talked about Daryl's problems with anyone. The doctors at the psych ward diagnosed his brother had had a mental breakdown when they admitted him, but never knew the length of his real underlying insanity.

While he was dangerous, violent and cruel, and oftentimes downright sinister, he sometimes showed remorse in his actions, on a very basic level. He committed his crimes in cold blood, craved control, but was never impulsive, and he had a ferocious predatory instinct Merle had never witnessed in any wild creature of the Appalachians. His crimes were random, sometimes seemed unorganized, but underneath, were always proactive rather than as a reaction to confrontation.

He was conniving and deceitful. Daryl didn't scream trustworthiness or sincerity at first glance; his eyes were too intense and intelligent, his stare was too _fierce_ , his voice—when he used it—was too calm and void, too deep. He was too manipulative, he lacked the ability to judge the morality of a situation (he liked Grimes' partly because the man killed his own children). Merle reckoned it wasn't because he didn't have a moral compass; rather, his compass was greatly skewed.    

Merle thought— _knew_ —people stopped calling Daryl _Devil's Spawn_ because it became obvious and didn't need saying. There was a look on his face people generally wanted to knock out just at first glance.

Daryl was handsome, true, but his eyes, the shape of his mouth, his whole body language were just off, and people could smell the wrongness on him, see the sin in his grins and shifty pupils. The ones who didn't know how to hide their fear of him were easy to read, and Merle knew they wanted Daryl in terrible pain just for _being_ and upsetting their pathetic little worlds. They didn't matter, Merle would never remember their names, their lives, and would never care about them.  

Sometimes he stopped and watched Daryl. Observed him— _stared_ —like his little brother didn't know how to do. He couldn't believe the kid had been like anyone else, _before_. Before he grew and became…the Devil himself, maybe? Merle didn't know.

People were simple, they never had anything nice to say about them Dixons, and all their lives things like ' _you are scum and I hope that you know it_ ,' had been a leitmotiv in their colorblind background. Hell, it was probably the first thing their daddy said to Merle when he was born. He would have said it to Daryl too, if he'd been coherent enough to put two words together and not trip on his belt in his rush to hit Daryl again, and again, and again.

The cracks in Daryl's smiles started to happen around his sixth birthday. Just about the same time the light, childish glee and happiness disappeared. That anniversary was fundamental in their lives. Merle won Daryl's custody, packed a small bag, and ran as far from Will Dixon and a burning house as possible.    

There was probably a special space in hell with Daryl's name on a seat and a spike in the chair. Merle guessed there was a similar one just next to it. And maybe his was a bit more elaborate. Maybe he deserved to suffer a bit more than Daryl, because at least, he didn't have the excuse of being sick.

Sometimes he wondered what Daryl saw when he looked at himself in the mirror. Did he see Will Dixon? Did he see Merle? Their Ma? Or something totally different, _someone_ totally different? Did he see what Merle saw? An obscenely neutral face, staring in listless apathy?

Merle caught himself several times wishing that face wasn't there, that it would just fall down the pipes like water, right to the bottom of a well. Daryl's face was sensual, masculine, hard, _nerves/tendons/blood_ under skin. Fragile, and breakable bones, but, oh so— _beautiful_. Like water pouring down his spine; he had a strong physique, and in Merle's reality, it was pretty much damning. The silver blue of Daryl's eyes, the chill in his gaze, his hatred for Men in general, and his everlasting wait for all things to end, be it at his hands or just as expected.

Daryl was calm like a rock, always standing straight, as if the world had to brace itself to behold his body and soul. More than once, Merle wondered where Daryl came from. It saddened him, and Merle abhorred that old, savage, ideal of perfect detachment Daryl mastered but that Merle would never achieve.

Merle somewhat envied his brother. He wished he was more like Daryl and didn't have to bare the hatred and shame he had been carrying on his back for a long time now. The doubt, the cloak of disgust, and the all-devouring dread he couldn't—wouldn't—share with Daryl.

Sometimes Merle wondered if the beast raging inside Daryl didn't like to swap bodies.

He was a different breed from Merle, or even Grimes, altogether. He gathered Daryl suffered from a combination of several mental illnesses, and maybe some real psychical screwed connection in his brain. Maybe due to some lesion he suffered in their mother's womb or as a newborn. Maybe their upbringing also played a large role in making him slide in insanity.  

And the look in Grimes' eyes after he finished explaining most of what happened since that hottest night in Georgia since 1916—well, Merle saw it nearly every time Daryl came back from one of his killing spree.

Peacefulness, pride.

And now, Grimes' eyes reflected love and a deep, seated need to protect.

Merle guessed Grimes' wasn't all that bad after all.

0

"What was your mother's name?"

Merle eyebrow twitched, but he didn't stop the movement of his fingers stroking Daryl's head sitting on his laps. The TV was running an old episode of  _Road Runner & Wile E. Coyote_, and Merle's eyes were fixed on the cartoon, but not really seeing it, glaring at the umpteenth attempt of the coyote to kill and eat the roadrunner.

" _Ma_ ," Daryl drawled hoarsely, TV show flickering in the diamond-cut of his eyes.

No more Lexie Dixon in the world, Merle thought.

Grimes' snorted and resumed gently caressing Daryl's leg, turning to look at Merle. "Ever wanted children?"

Merle was the one to snort this time. "I already got a kid," he answered, rubbing behind Daryl's ear.  

Rick turned to watched the TV screen. "I liked what you cooked."

Daryl shifted slightly. "Was just bunny stew," he whispered raspingly.

They all watched the TV screen when suddenly the coyote got smashed with a wrecking ball. "Uhm," Daryl hummed pensively, "that would never happen."

Grimes snorted, and Merle let out an amused breath, pressing his hand on top of Daryl's head, while the other one kept stroking his burning belly under his shirt. "Well, no, baby, that's why they call 'em cartoons, 'n not documentaries." Daryl nodded absently at his answer and wrapped his arms tighter around Merle's waist.

Merle leaned back and stared at the ceiling.

He wondered if painting it white would clean his soul.

0

Sometimes, Merle forgot. Truly forgot. Then he'd touch Daryl, see something in his eyes, and hear a strange inflexion of his voice.

And he'd remember.  

0 

It's a dull, aching gray, absolute miserable day as Merle rolled down his truck window, not knowing what to feel at the steady beat of rain blowing against the side of his face and drenching his shirt.

He parked on a free parking slot and threw his cigarette away before taking the stairs two at a time. He looked around as he walked to the clerk and racked his knuckles on the wooden counter. "I've come here to post bail for my lil' brother."

The fat man sitting behind the counter looked up, and up, because he was short and portly—a little piggy man with narrowed eyes and a glistering forehead—and yellowed, crooked teeth. "Name?" he squeaked.

Merle put his hands flat on the counter before fisting them and unconsciously erasing his prints with the sleeve of his coat. "Dixon. Daryl."

The man turned to his computer and slowly began to click on his keyboard with his pointer fingers. Merle nearly expected him to spell his brother's name. King County's department was small, and Merle wondered how many men they had in custody for the man to take so much time.

"Ah-ah," the man huffed and rubbed his forehead, as if looking for a computer file had tired him physically. "Dixon Daryl. Brought at around three in the morning for—" he stopped and blinked in rapid succession, before continuing, "—for trespassing on private property and illegal hunting."

Merle glowered. "Who arrested him?"

People around here didn't get arrested for illegal hunting. They get fined, they get warned, but they sure as hell didn't spend a night in lockup.

"Officer Shane Walsh."

Merle smacked his lips and rocked on the ball of his feet. "I wanna see my lil' brother."

The man nodded, the fat of his neck dangling with the movement. "I'm sorry, he's being interrogated right now."

Merle felt his anger start to take over, but a hand on his shoulder stopped him before he reach for the piggy man and bashed his head through the screen of his computer.

"Hey, Merle."

Merle turned and pointed his chin up. "Grimes. Where's Daryl? He called me twenty minutes ago."

Grimes nodded and mentioned for Merle to follow him down the hall. "Shane's a little bit upset right now. He's spoiling for a fight, you know, because of what happen," he whispered with a small smirk. "So, he's looking for any reason to vent his rage."

Merle growled. "By arresting my lil' brother?"

Grimes nodded. "Yeah, pretty much."

Merle sighed and rubbed his forehead. "And ya couldn't stop him?"

Grimes shook his head. "We're not partners anymore. Chief decided I needed my space to recover. Shane's pretty much a pariah around here. Word was quick to spread, and he's become persona non-grata. No one wants to partner with him."

Merle bit back a chuckle and followed Grimes in a small room made of gray concrete and a two-way mirror. "Piggy said he's interrogating him."

Grimes waved at the mirror and pressed the button of the interphone for them to hear what was happening in the interrogation room. Daryl was sitting in a chair, impassive and blank, while Walsh was pacing around like a puffed-up lion.

 

"So, Dixon," Walsh stared, "tell me what you were doing on good ol' Mr. Lattimore's land in the middle of the night?"

Daryl blinked slowly, uninterested and shifted his head on the side, eyes following Walsh sideways. There wasn't blood on him, thank God; he looked composed, and not half-crazed like Merle had already seen him.

Walsh sniffed and walked behind Daryl, bending to put his mouth next to his ear in what he believed was an intimidating maneuver. "C'mon, Dixon, who hunts in the middle of the night?" he sneered. "What were you doing?"

Daryl brought his hands on the table in front of him and Merle bristle when he saw the handcuffs. Even from where he stood, Merle could see how sore his wrists looked from too tight cuffs.

Walsh snorted and grabbed a file from the table, opening it slowly and making a scene of scanning it silently. "Says here you took a little trip to the nut house a while ago." He chuckled. "I knew you were trouble the minute I saw you and your good for nothing brother," he continued.

Merle took a step closer to the mirror and tighten his fists. He knew how it was going to end if Walsh continued provoking Daryl, especially by using Merle in the argument. The cop could spit any nasty things about Daryl without making him blink, but the minute he started attacking Merle, Daryl was bound to lose it.

He glanced at Grimes sideways and narrowed his eyes, wondering why the man wasn't doing anything. Was he setting Daryl up? Was he waiting for Daryl to blow up on purpose just to get back at Walsh?

Merle didn't believe Daryl loved Grimes. He probably only liked him—if barely, but love wasn't in the picture, never was, never will. But if the man had been such a monster as to go to the length of killing his own children just to make his cheating wife suffer, Merle was sure the man was capable of throwing Daryl under a bus just to get his revenge against Walsh.

He turned back to the mirror and pressed a shoulder against the cool glass, willing Daryl to keep his cool.

Walsh was standing behind Daryl; he was so close to his ear their cheeks were almost pressed against each other. "What is it, Dixon?" he asked in a low voice, "d'you feel angry 'bout what I said? About your asshole brother?" Daryl kept watching directly in front of him at the mirror, right thought it and through Merle. "Why do you follow him around like a lost puppy? The man already had you locked up, yeah?" he said, gently tapping the file under his hand, "said here he signed for those doctors to fry your brain." He chuckled and rubbed his nose with his thumb. "I know I'd feel angry. I'd blame him for having doctors play with my head." He shook his head. "Does he really deserve your loyalty that much if he let them to do that to you?"

Merle licked his lips and absently tapped the tip of his fingers against the glass. Walsh was trying to get Daryl to turn over Merle for some phantom offence. He was actually endeavoring to have his little brother betray him by using things that happened years ago and that had been out of their control. He was cunning, quite clever in a way. It was a good angle. It could have worked.

It could have.

But Walsh had clearly forgotten one big, major factor. Probably something that never brushed against his mind when concerning the Dixons.

The end of the morning was anticlimactic; Merle finally got to post bail, Walsh got a blame by the Sheriff for interrogating someone without having read them their rights after Grimes smiled blandly at him, and Daryl finally got to get home.

This time, no blood had been spilled.

But something stayed lodge at the back of Merle's throat when he saw his baby brother stare at Grimes with a certain glint in his eyes. Something new that never before had been sent in the cop's direction. Something predatory.

He guessed, now Daryl saw Grimes as a prey and not an equal anymore.

Merle thought, the beast had stopped playing with its food, and now, it was hungry.

Chilling Merle to the bones with fire. 

0

Merle remembered Daryl thought something (someone) was under his bed when he was around six. Not long after it was just the two of them. Daryl was still a little boy then. With his fears and hopes, and still scared of the monsters, and wasn't that cold-hearted ice warrior-like hunter he was today. When he still _felt_.

He remembered waking almost every night to high-pitched scream of pure panic, followed by pleading sobbing. Running down the hall in the cold darkness and reaching his little brother's room sitting in the corner of the bedroom, body trembling in terror and drenched in cold sweat, Merle could feel his heart pounding almost painfully in his chest.

Today, he hoped to go back to a night in particular and never leave it. Just have his little brother warm, and small, and fragile in his arms for him to protect and never let go.

"Why ain't ya on the bed?" he asked, walking to Daryl, six year old, tiny and sobbing in his hands. "D'ya think there's somethin' underneath?" he said as he crouched down in front of the little boy. "Hey, everyone thinks that sometimes. That's just how people think at night."

Daryl sniffed and rubbed his eyes with trembling fingers. "Why?"

Merle pinched his lips and sat crossed legs in front of his brother. "Did ya have a dream?" he asked softly.

"Yeah," Daryl whispered, his voice wobbly with distressed.

Merle nodded and looked around, sighing. "D'ya know why dreams are called dreams?"

The kid blinked in confusion and tilted his head on the side, staring at Merle's chin thoughtfully. "Why?"

Merle leaned over and whispered conspiringly. "'Cause they ain't real. If they were, they wouldn't need a name." He stood and walked to the bed.

"What're ya doin'?" Daryl asked, face drenched, lips trembling, but clearly peaked with interest.

Merle knelt down and pushed the duvet aside to look under the bed. "D'ya know what's under there?" he asked with a small smile at the corner of his mouth.

Daryl frowned and shook his head. "What?"

Merle quickly slithered under the bed with a loud "ME!"

Daryl let out a small giggle and Merle chuckled. "C'mon! It's perfectly safe."

Daryl crawled to him on all four and joined him under the bed on his belly. Merle turned his head to look at him, his forehead nearly touching the underside of the mattress. "See? Nobody here. Except us."

Daryl sniffed and rubbed his runny nose on his sleeve. "Sometimes I hear noises."

Merle shrugged slightly. "The apartment's old, 'f course ya hear noises."

Daryl seemed to ponder on that before reaching a tiny hand to touch Merle's arm. "Can ya hear dreams?" he asked.

Merle nodded with a hum. "If ya're clever enough, but they can't harm you. You know, sometimes we think there's something behind us, and the space under your bed is what's behind ya at night. Simple as that." He paused. "Are ya scared?"

Daryl bit his lip and nodded after a moment.

"Well that's good." Merle answered. "D'ya know why that's good?"

Daryl frowned, clearly not understanding. "Why?"

Merle ran a hand on the side of Daryl head, pushing his hair back and rubbing his wet cheeks. "It's when your heart is beating so hard," he took Daryl's hand. "I can feel it through your hands. There's so much blood and oxygen pumping through your brain, it's like…rocket fuel!" he exclaimed, smiling softly when Daryl's eyes went huge with wonder. "Right now, ya could run faster 'n ya could fight harder, you could jump higher than ever in your life, 'n ya are so alert it's like ya can slow down time." He paused and continued caressing Daryl's face lovingly. "What's wrong with scared? Scared is a _superpower_ , baby. It's your superpower. There is danger in this room and guess what? It's _you_. D'ya feel it?"

Daryl nodded mutely, amazement all over his small face, and blue eyes huge.

"D'ya think the monster under your bed feels it too? D'ya think he's scared?" Merle asked after a while and grinned when Daryl shook his head. "Nah, that monster is a loser. Turn your back on him."

Daryl giggled when Merle laughed, before they fell silent again. "Am I safe now?" Daryl asked after a while in a small voice.

Merle thought about it for a moment before extracting the both of them from under the bed, and sitting Daryl gently on the bed. "Wait here," he said quietly, before turning back and starting rummaging through Daryl's toys chest. He grabbed a handful of thing before walking back to the bed and kneeling in front of the little boy, showing him what was in his hands, and starting putting them on the ground around the bed. "See what I'm doin'?" he asked quietly.

Daryl leaned over the bed and nodded mutely, thumb firmly held in his mouth, staring as Merle put several toy plastic soldiers on the ground around the bed. "This is your army, 'n they're gonna guard under your bed." He put a soldier down before showing another one to Daryl. "See this one? This one's the boss one, the colonel. He's goin' to keep a special eye out."

Daryl frowned. "It's broken, that one. He ain't got a gun," he pointed out around his thumb.

Merle nodded and put it on the ground with the others. "That's why he's the boss," he said. "A soldier so brave he doesn't need a gun. He can keep the whole world safe. What shall we call him?"

Daryl reached a hand and gently patted Merle's cheek. " _Merle_ ," he answered matter-of-factly.

Merle looked up sharply and saw the love and adoration in his little brother's eyes. He smiled tenderly and kissed Daryl on the forehead. "Aw'right," he whispered hoarsely. "Let's call him Merle."

0

Merle wasn't going to complain that his business was _too_ successful; in fact, he didn't believe there was such thing as being _too_ successful. He believed people got what they deserved. If you worked hard to get what you wanted, then you deserved to reap the rewards of the hours, days, _years_ spent slaving away.

Mike and Walt worked seamlessly, didn't ask too much out of Merle as a boss, and he was man enough to be lenient when he had to and stern when needed. They both were in their fifties and new what real hard work was, knew you couldn't get the money to buy the latest new smartphone without getting your hands dirty. Carol was the same. She respected _work_ ; she respected the need to show she was able to work hard to get results and that she wasn't there just to surf the internet or use the company phone for personal calls.

He didn't need to think about Daryl's work ethic, because when the kid had his mind on something, you really couldn't do anything to get him to stop. Fixing engines, deconstructing and reconstructing a car from scratch. That was the kind of meticulous, precise, and organized work he liked—thrived doing, in fact. Because when he was focused on something entirely, he didn't _burnburnburn_ so much. 

No, what galled him really, was to have to bring in new people into what he considered a tight-knit unit that had been prosperous for years.

He sneered at most of the guys passing in his office with fancy diplomas from colleges delivering degrees in automobile maintenance technology, or transportation design, or mechanical engineering. All they saw was a successful garage, now known throughout the entire State of Georgia and most of the East Coast, and a great paycheck at the end of the month, inflated thanks to their useless diplomas.  

He didn't need engineers, he needed guys who could build a car and not look disgusted when oil got on their hands. He didn't need freaking geniuses, he already had Daryl, and the kid loved to roll around in mud and blood, so that was saying something.

"—and I only stayed at M.I.T for the first year, if you want my opinion, that school is overrated, really, and—" he tuned out the fifth candidate this day and tried not to look bored to death. He came to the garage dressed in a suit, hair gelled back, _and carrying a briefcase_ , for God's sake; what was Merle supposed to do with him?

The door opened violently and banged against the wall and Merle blinked at Daryl standing in the threshold. The guy looked spooked to death, frozen in his seat, staring at Daryl like he'd seen a ghost. Merle rubbed his mouth to hide his smile and watched his little brother walk behind Merle's chair and sit on the table behind his desk. He stared at the man with ferocious intensity, not blinking once and waiting.

 _Waitingwaitingwaiting_. The man babbled a few incoherent sentences before biting his lips and looking up at Merle expectantly, clearly not knowing what to do.

Merle cleared his throat, felt Daryl's eyes shift minutely on him before going back to stare at the guy's forehead. "Maybe your sixth sense spotted it, but I don't like people very much. I'm just not a very nice person," Merle started. He took the guy's resume and crumpled it in a ball. "I don't fuckin' care 'bout what fancy schools ya went to, what I care is if you're able to tell a wrench from a hammer." He sniffed a mocking laugh. "Clearly, you ain't. Get the hell out of here."

The guy didn't wait for anything else and literally ran out of the office like a whipped dog. Merle sighed in annoyance, pressing the palm of his hands in his eye socket feeling a headache start with vengeance. He heard slight movement and when he opened his eyes, Daryl had seated himself on the desk in front of Merle, his legs bracketing him from each side of his chair. The kid leaned over and pressed his hands on Merle's temple, and as carefully as he could, started massaging gently.

It was moments like where Merle could pretend nothing was wrong with his baby brother. When Daryl showed uncharacteristic moment of tenderness. How his hands, used to kill, hunt and maim, could also be soft, loving and caring. It felt good and it felt right.        

"How the hell am I gonna find someone?" he sighed in annoyance. "I can't stand to look at their ugly mugs no more."

Daryl just hummed and kept rubbing, soothing, loving. "Next hoss could be the one," he mumbled, staring at Merle's chin.  

Merle chuckled and put his hand on Daryl's thigh. "Ah, here's my fuckin' optimistic baby bro." Daryl smirked and shrugged in slight embarrassment.

Someone cleared their throat and they both turned to see Carol standing in the threshold of the office, looking aggravated. "Next appointment's here. I might be your secretary Merle, but I'm not your errand dog. Next time, get your fucking _prospects_ yourself." And with that she turned on her heels and left, leaving a slightly nervous little weasel of a man behind her standing alone at the door. 

"I might also look for 'nother secretary with that attitude, Carol!" Merle yelled after her, but she was already gone or didn't care at all. Both, probably. And they all knew Merle wasn't serious about firing Carol. She was too useful and good at her job for them to afford losing her. And she was family. In Merle's book, that always came first.

Daryl slide down the desk and sat on the edge, observing impassively the man as he still hovered at the door. Merle sighed irritably and waved at the chair standing in front of his desk. "Well, sit down," he grunted. Daryl tilted his head on the side and turned it away to look at the window.

Merle sighed and rubbed his forehead. It was going to be a long fucking day.

0  

 _"Listen_ ," Daryl drawled drunkenly, whisky glass dangling dangerously left and right from the tip of his fingers, cigarette resting at the corner of his mouth. "Question: why do we talk out loud when we know we're alone? Conjecture: because we know we're not. Evolution perfects survival skills. There are perfect hunters. There are perfect defenses." He nodded to himself, half-lidded eyes shifting between Merle and his shot of whisky. Paradoxically, Daryl always used big words when he was drunk, and it was generally only in those moments that Merle could really see the brilliance and intelligence shine in Daryl's speech and eyes.

"Question: why is there such thing as perfect hiding? Answer: how would you know? Logically, if evolution were to perfect a creature whose primary skill were to hide from view, how would you know it existed? It could be with us every second and we would never know. How would you detect it, even sense it…except in those moments when, for no clear reason, you choose to speak aloud? What would such a creature want? What would it do? You know sometimes when you talk to yourself, what if you're not?"

Merle sighed and drowned his own shot before waving his empty glass at the barman. Daryl tended to get philosophical when drunk—that, or homicidal. Merle didn't know which he liked more. One surely was cleaner than the other, but sometimes that big brain of his was literally killing his little brother with its incessant chatter and thousands of interrogations. 

"Not what?" he dutifully asked.

Daryl threw his head back to gulp his whisky and waved at the barman like Merle just did, except a bit less steady on his stool. "What if it's not you you're talking to?" he slurred, his cigarette falling on his hand unnoticed, burning ash dusting on his skin.

Merle frowned at that and grabbed it, hating how Daryl never reacted to pain like any other sane person.

"Proposition: what if no one is ever really alone?" Daryl said. "What if every single living being has a companion, a silent passenger, a _shadow_ ? What if the prickle on the back of your neck is the breath of something close behind you? I think everybody, at some point in their lives, has the exact same nightmare. You make up, or you think you do, and there's someone in the dark, someone close, or you think there might be. So you sit and turn on the light. And the room looks different at night. It teaks and creaks and breathes. And you tell yourself there's nobody there, nobody watching, nobody listening, _nobody_ there at all. And you very nearly believe it. You really, really try. And then…"

Merle blinked because it sounded familiar to most of Daryl's nightmare when he was still small and crying after a bad dream. "And then what?" he asked lowly.

Daryl shook his head and drowned his glass mutely. Apparently he was finished, and Merle wouldn't be able to get any more out of him tonight.

It could be annoying, but Merle was so used to Daryl's strange reactions and behaviors that it didn't even faze him anymore. Daryl was what he was. Simple as that.

It was the Dixons' lives, and Merle wouldn't have it any other way.

He pressed a hand on the back of Daryl's neck and gently rubbed the warm skin as he sipped his beer and closed his eyes against the noises, and the movements, and the people surrounding them.

In the end, Daryl was always the most important thing in the world. 

0

Merle often remembered Daryl's first grade teacher Miss Phelps.

She had been Daryl's first teacher for his first year at school. He didn't attend preschool—for obvious reasons—and Merle didn't need stupid people poisoning Daryl from an early age with morals and arts and crafts.

No, his baby needed to learn to fend for himself, have a spine and stand-up and never back down from anything. Most of all, he needed to teach Daryl never to show fear of any kind. People around their parts were always looking for that small weakness, that small window of opportunity when they could pounce on you and rip you to shreds.

Miss Phelps had been young, in her mid-twenties or early thirties. In a way, it was an advantage for them. For Daryl. She hadn't that overly jaded look in her eyes from too many years to teach, and her smile wasn't forced; she hadn't given up on kids yet.

That first day, she didn't look down on them like two pieces of white trash, huddled in the corridor, Daryl tightly clenching his hands in fear of being separated. 

It oddly felt good.

0

Daryl and Grimes never broke up. They never really were a couple in the traditional sense of the word, but Merle had a hard time forgiving the cop for trapping his little brother and putting him in a position of weakness between Walsh and a grudge.

Grimes understood. Actually apologized— _the asshole_ —and promised he'd been a bit blindsided by his need of revenge, and got crazy for a second. Absent from his brain, (and doesn't Merle know what he was talking about?)

Merle understood revenge, he knew what it felt. But he also knew how it left a bitter taste in the throat and never went away. But at present, between the ghosts of Will Dixon and his perfect new family, and Daryl, it was his baby's life that mattered. Daryl was more precious than anything else. Daryl was the most important thing, and Merle used his background and hard lived life to make the man understand that it had to be the first and last thing on his mind day-in and day-out.

Daryl was the priority. Simple as that.

After his arrest, Daryl disappeared for a few days into the woods. Merle wasn't worried, it wasn't the first time and sure as hell wouldn't be the last. Grimes was worried, he could see it in the flitting blue eyes, in his tense shoulder, in the way his fists tightened as he looked out into the woods from the porch at night. Waiting, berating himself for the blatant betrayal, and drowning in guilt.

If Merle hadn't been so angry at the cop, he would have reassured him, he would have told him Daryl wouldn't be mad once he came back from the woods. Except…it wasn't true. Daryl could hold a grudge that lasted days, weeks, or in some cases, _years_. If Daryl was sicker than he was, he'd literally eat Grimes alive with the need to avenge himself.

When he came back from the woods he was a mess; dirty to the bone, skin nearly black from mud, soot, and filth, hair tangled and matted with sweat and blood. His eyes were half-crazed and feral, like the beast had been released and Daryl didn't get the chance to tame it back inside before coming back. He looked like one of those animal spirits from Apaches stories their mother liked so much. He didn't look human at all, but only rendered to his most basic setting, uncontrollable. Insane like he was inside and unable to hide it anymore.

He didn't look like Merle's sweet little brother.

He looked like a stranger inhabiting the familiar body Merle knew by heart.

At that moment, he didn't know if he'd be able to bring Daryl back from the pit of madness and darkness he'd fallen into.

He couldn't hate Grimes more than at that horrible realization.

0

Merle underestimated his little brother and only understood it when he caught sight of him with the chilly glitter of a blade against Grimes' throat. He heard him murmur _'don't make me use it'_ , but only understood a few days later that he didn't mean the knife. For all of his seemingly erratic behavior, Daryl was greatly posed and strategic.

Merle should have known, really, he _should have known_ his brother would never shack up with a cop without having a pretty thick layer of dirt on him. He was too smart, too clever, too fast, _just too much of everything_.

Somewhere, somehow, Daryl had intangible proofs of Grimes killing his kids, and his brother wasn't afraid to use them to get his own way.

They didn't break up, but Merle knew Daryl will never forgive Grimes for setting him up against Walsh.

He would hold that grudge until his death.  

0

And then one day, report started to fall. A virus was spreading rapidly through the nation and had went worldwide after a few weeks. Daryl didn't bat an eyelash, Grimes got this intense focused look on his face, and Merle just didn't know what to do with it all.

His brother had never really came back from that day into the woods, and when one morning Merle stepped outside to have a smoke and saw a man lumbering out of the woods, he wasn't really surprised.

He watched, observed, grimaced at the sight of the man's face half gone and rotten, but didn't move. The man grunted and growled in raspy, nightmarish sounds, and started walking quicker toward him when he spotted him.

Merle felt Daryl come next to him silently, crossbow ready on his back, bowie knife at his belt and hand on the tilt. He took the gun and knife Daryl handed him and stepped down the porch toward _the thing_.

He aimed, absently noticed _it_ was old Mr. Jenkins from the farm a few miles away and fired it through the heart. When that didn't do anything to stop it, he fired again and blew it in the head. It reeled back violently before crumbling on the ground in a wet, squashy sound, blood and gore exploding from its skull.   

He didn't feel remorse, he didn't feel anything at all. 

And finally, _finally_ , Merle understood why Daryl was the way he was.

He didn't know how it was going to end, but he knew the dead were walking the earth, and his baby was born to rule this world

0

"If I Had A Heart"

This will never end 'cause I want more  
More, give me more, give me more  
  
If I had a heart I could love you  
If I had a voice I would sing  
After the night when I wake up  
I'll see what tomorrow brings  
  
Dangling feet from window frame  
Will they ever ever reach the floor?  
More, give me more, give me more  
  
Crushed and filled with all I found  
Underneath and inside   
Just to come around  
More, give me more, give me more

—Fever Ray—

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And my story ends. I hope you had a good time reading. Thank you all for your amazing kindness in comments ♥


	7. Merle's family album

                                 


	8. Soundtrack

**If I Had A Heart - Soundtrack**

1\. Into The Night - Julee Cruise  


2\. When Under Ether - PJ Harvey  


3\. Aching Bones - Nadine Shah  


4\. Faith In Love - CSS  


5\. I'd Love To Change The World - Jetta  


6\. Honeythief - Halou  


7\. Buried - Shlohmo  


8\. The Carny - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds  


9\. Red Right Hand (Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds cover) - PJ Harvey  


10\. My Least Favorite Life - Lera Lynn  


11\. White Rabbit - Jefferson Airplane  


12\. Rocking Horse - The Dead Weather  


13\. Fuck U - Archive  


14\. If I Had A Heart - Fever Ray  



End file.
